Tag: #summer

Summer’s End

Summer’s End

Labor Day Weekend at the Bay was a full-on Summerpalooza. Soft shell crabs and tomatoes…Crab cakes with corn…Grilled steaks and more crabs at our neighbor Vinnie’s home…Bike rides on the island…Drinking crushes at a beach bar… Eating fresh peaches, the juice running down my chin. It’s all been great, but I’m ready for Fall. 

Ahhh Summer – Cooking Soft Shells One Night, and Drinking Crushes at a Beach Bar the Next Day

What a strange Summer it has been, and I’m not just talking about the politics. The weather was … unusual. Quite cool at the start, we endured a drought for a couple of months. In early July it turned hotter than Hades, followed by a rain of several inches, a cool week in August with nighttime temps in the 40s, and then record setting heat the week before Labor Day.

Technically, we have about three weeks until the Autumnal Equinox marks the official start of Fall on September 22d, but of course Labor Day has always served as the unofficial end of Summer. 

Growing up, Summer was my favorite season. It was even better than Christmas time. When school let out at the start of Summer, there was unlimited time with endless possibilities. It was the time of going to the pool or Pitstick’s Dairy Lake for swimming – The ding-a-ling of the ice cream truck in the evenings, with cones for a dime – Staying out late – Pick-up Baseball behind Hohner’s house next to the graveyard – Boy Scout Summer Camp at Ki-Shua-Wau  – Cicadas, grasshoppers and lightning bugs – Making funny noises into the blowing fan in the front room before we had AC – Cookouts with burgers and Mom’s potato salad – Riding bikes with my buddies Howard and Tim, and later, with Cathy. Endless Possibilities.

As I grew older, Summers became shorter. Still fun, they were no longer endless and instead became finite in their possibilities.  Rereading the previous paragraph and the list of things I enjoyed about Summer, it is perhaps no coincidence they are activities from my youth. Is Summer more of a young person’s season?

Eventually, Summer lost its claim as my favorite season. Was it the passing of youth, or did something else cause the change?  I can’t answer that, but Autumn rose to the fore. 

Ahhhh, Autumn. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways – The drop in temperature and humidity – The crispness of a fall morning – Autumnal light (yes, that’s a real thing) – Going on vacations and knowing there will be fewer children wherever we are – The color of the leaves – Eating soups, stews and roasts again – Wild (not farm raised) oysters – Wearing a sweatshirt and shorts – Steeplechase Races – Orion reappearing in the night sky – Migrating birds – Walks in the woods and the crunch of leaves underfoot.  Here in Virginia, we are extra lucky. I defy you to find anywhere with more beautiful colors and weather than Virginia in the Fall.

During Fall, I enjoy watching the slow transition from Summer to Winter and how the world changes. It makes me feel alive as we leave the lethargy of Summer heat behind, but aren’t yet forced inside by the cold and snow of Winter. Although I know Spring is the season of new beginnings, I feel most alive in the Fall. 

We spent the last few days of August and the start of September at the Bayhouse on Tilghman Island. The heat wave eventually broke and it cooled down to seasonal weather. The end of Labor Day itself was absolutely gorgeous – one of those evenings you get a few times a year. It doesn’t feel like Fall yet, but I know it’s coming soon and I am ready to greet it. Author Victoria Erickson said it best for me: “If a year was tucked inside of a clock, then Autumn would be the magic hour.”

Labor Day Weekend – the End of Summer.

Addendum:

I’ve written two other Autumn related blogs:

  • As I walk and wander through the nearby woods this fall, I find my mind wandering as well. It is Autumn in the autumn of my life and I feel the passage of time. Death and decline are both more evident, and not quite the strangers they once were. It is not my own […] Continue here: https://mnhallblog.wordpress.com/2023/10/24/autumn-walks/
  • It’s not your imagination. The light actually is different this time of year. Golden and lush, it’s almost magical. It’s not just the color of the leaves, or the chill in the air. The light is different and it’s changing fast. Poets love to write about it, but there’s science behind the […] Continue at: https://mnhallblog.wordpress.com/2022/10/26/autumnal-light/

The Sound of Summer’s Ending

The Sound of Summer’s Ending

Around this time of year, at not quite the end of summer, there’s a sound that always says to me, “Yes, it’s still summer. Enjoy it while you can.” I’m sure you know it too. It’s the sweet summertime sound of the cicadas. It’s September now, but their music will still be with us for a little while longer. There’s a lesson for us too.

I’m not talking about the periodic thirteen or seventeen year cicadas. I’m referring to the ones known as the Dog-Day Cicadas, so named because they make their way out of the ground every year during the dog days of summer in July and August. You know them. These annual cicadas provide the background chorus for summer’s soundtrack. They are so much a part of summer’s song that sometimes you don’t notice their continual buzz at all. Until you do. Like the lightning bug, they remind me of the more carefree days of my youth.

This past Labor Day weekend, I listened to them for four straight days. The weather was gorgeous with warm days and cool nights. It was so nice, we’d turned off our AC and with the windows open, could hear the cicadas whether we were inside or out. Each day, I heard them all day long and into the evening.

That “noise” is their mating call. As with most of us, they are looking for a partner before they die. With only a few weeks above ground, they may have a greater sense of urgency than we do.

As I listened to them on Labor Day itself, I thought “There’s not much time left little buddies. Soon it will turn chilly and the leaves will fall. Like summer itself, you too will disappear. Make the most of it while you can.”