An Ode to Endless Summer

I wonder if an endless summer would still seem like a good thing after months of temperatures in the 90's and 100's. I'm inclined to think I might eventually become weary of such a season. Really, if summer were truly endless, the entire concept of "season" would go right out of the window. The word implies that there must be change throughout the year, throughout life. "To everything there is a season . . ."

The first day after Labor Day has taken a wet and cooler turn. I can't say that it is truly unwelcome, though it feels more like a visitor who will be staying briefly, then leaving again until the next short and pleasant visit.

But, as happens every year, I must grudgingly accept that this brief cooling off is merely Autumn moving into the room, resting its big suitcase on the newly unfolded luggage rack and where it will come back a little later to move its accoutrements into the slightly more permanent home of the dresser drawers and armoire. The smell of sand and sunscreen in the bathroom will soon be replaced by the musky scent of crisp leaves and cold air, eventually giving way to wood smoke and spiced cider.

It's me. I'm the one slow to shift gears. And I know I am far from being the only one.

Summer is still, in my mind, the time of year when "everyone" gets to be a kid, to live a carefree life. No bulky layers to pull on and heft around outside while still trying to move naturally and freely. No shivering with cold and being told to put a sweater on while you're indoors. When stepping out of the shower there's no wishing for a heat lamp to replace the tub-to-towel-to-bathrobe ritual designed to avoid the goosebumps of clean skin in cold weather.

Summer is the time when colors are bright and cheerful. Shorts, skirts, T-shirts, sandals, seer-sucker, woven hats, and suntans with sun-streaked hair. Children drawing with sidewalk chalk and becoming rainbow-colored themselves. Little league teams dotting fields all over the county. Owners walking dogs and walkers walking themselves by 6:00 a.m., enjoying the early sunrise and the later sunset. Fruits from the garden that taste better than any at even the "best" grocery stores and even more so because you grew them yourself.

Summer, when the demands of school and extra-curricular activities lessen their grip and allow for deeper breaths and staring up at the blue sky. When rain either comes in dramatic, twenty-minute bursts, complete with light show and sending everyone for cover in the late afternoon, or gently falls, cooling the hot asphalt and sending little steam drifts waving upward, moisture floating back into the air to be saved up for later.

Summer, when the smoke from hot coals mingling with food runs, flying through the streets, taunting and goading the neighbors into competing to see who can out-grill all the others. The loud whine of motors moving across the ground just before the smell of cut-grass—and the sound of the sneezes that sometimes follow. The majestic, fluffy white clouds that drift leisurely through the sky like benevolent guardians keeping watch over the fragile beings below.

To be realistic, however, I must admit to wanting my outside temperatures low enough to keep my windows open all day long, and summers in the mid-Atlantic do not often, if ever, accommodate that wish. And perhaps it's just as well. If I don't want summer to leave even after it has forced me to shutter my windows from the oppressive heat, I can only imagine how I would feel if summer was truly perfect. I suppose I will just have to welcome Autumn with open arms, smiling warmly and entertaining it for a while until the next guest chases it away and takes over the room.