Simply Summer

Some things are just simply summer...summer reading programs at the library, swimming lessons, sprinklers, slip 'n slides, eating raw beans from the garden, crickets at night, shorts and blackberry picking, the rattle of the canner and its steam, sunsets, heatwaves, dripping Popsicles....summer.

We are in the thick of it, the direct middle. Since my family is bound to the school year calendar, this is when I begin to notice the school supplies displayed in stores. I desperately ignore the impending doom. This is when I panic because next month is August, then it all comes quickly to a stop. Instead of living January to December, I visualize the world turning August to September.

It just seem more accurate, more right. Shouldn't the year be put to sleep when you bring in the last harvest? September signifies that for me. It is when I do my last bit of beans, get in one last taste of a fresh peach. It is when my mums bloom while the rest of my flowers begin to fade. The amber hues rejoice. The grass is rough on my toes; we've stopped watering. We are waiting for the rains of October to green it up again.

I always look forward, but I'm getting better at living in the current. There is still a lot of summer living left. There are plenty of evening swims to be had. I'm giddy with anticipation, soon I will be devouring the orchard of its plums and pears. I can't wait to smell the ripe grapes in the warm evening. There are plenty of nights to sleep with the window open and listen to the crickets sing and discuss.

The tractors have yet to sir the earth and dust the world with their discs. I can remember crossing the fields right after the first plow. I was a child and needed to play with my neighbors. They lived two fields away. My ankles would twist with delight over the large clods of dirt. It was the subsequent plowing that made the dirt smooth and soft, no shoes needed.

As a child, summer seemed endless. It felt like a whole year past in those three month. It felt like I grew up and became a whole new person for all my friends to see once school came around again.

Even as I type this now, I can smell summer breeze through my office windows, breeze in and sit next to me as I ponder it all.