Short Stories From 10 Years Ago – August 3, 2004
Summer Is Fading Fast
Short Stories From 10 Years Ago – August 3, 2004 – It’s hard to believe that it’s August already. It was just May and the leaves were full and fresh with spring green. An entire summer lay ahead – warm days and soft, lazy patio evenings. Those days have disappeared – gone in a flash with client meetings, research, offers, week-end open houses and contractor visits. June and July slipped reluctantly away.
The hanging potted plants in my pergola have gone from being full and heavy with colourful blooms, to showing the first signs of a duller green on the leaves. There are fewer new flowers. The petals are falling on the deck more frequently. My dogwood’s Granny Smith leaves are starting to curl a bit on the edges and the ferns underneath are brown on the tips.
The grape ivy on the fence will only need one more pruning before its growth will be finished for the season. The purple flox by the back gate is full August purple. The garden has entered a different phase – it’s getting ready to coast into autumn.
I remember this time of year when I was a kid. My brothers and I had played outside all summer. The days were long and sunny and the evenings turned slowly and quietly dark from pale grey streaks. We gazed at the stars, planned adventures for the next day and stayed outdoors until the last possible moment saying – “We’re coming …”. We washed our hands and faces, brushed our teeth and tumbled into bed, exhausted.
We couldn’t eat breakfast fast enough in the morning and then it was back outside again. We played in the woods, biked, hiked, climbed through the rocks and crevices behind our home, built go carts, picked black berries, helped in the garden and plotted great takeovers of the neighbourhood. When we grew up and were “in charge – we’d never have to go inside at the end of the day. Summer was mysterious and magic and endless. School was a boring faraway place with books and rules and teachers.
As teenagers our priorities changed – we stared to date, we didn’t play together much anymore. We all had summer jobs and when we weren’t busy, we hung out with our own friends. The defining day in August was the start of the Canadian National Exhibition, and we tried to find a day to travel to Toronto during its run. My week ends and any free time were spent at Sauble Beach. University summers were much the same – earning money for the fall term and planning our lives as adults. We couldn’t wait to grow up.
Well, if I’d known then, what I know now – I’d have been less interested in rushing into adulthood. Alas, that’s not the way life works. Being a full-time grown up has its glorious moments, but I cherish fond memories of those carefree summer days when nothing mattered but playing outdoors in the summer sun. I was thinking about this today as I looked around my garden. The days are getting shorter. The fall harvest is at hand.
There is already a sense that things are winding down, the pace is slower, birds and animals are instinctively planning for the fall and winter. The four baby raccoons who wander through my garden at night are big and fat, and are often out without their mother now. The wonderful sense of expectancy and the unfolding of new life that accompanies spring has gone – maturing into the fullness of late summer.
Before I know it – October will be ripe with autumn colour and the last few days of delicious, Indian summer days will slip away. Then November will be dull and grey. December will see the vibrant energy of the holiday season and the joyful celebration of another new year.
As I get older time goes by more quickly. I’m more acutely aware of its passing and more appreciative of every day that I enjoy good health, friends, family and the blessings of my career and my home. I’m still on vacation this week and the weather is supposed to be warm and sunny for the most part. I have a busy day tomorrow, but for the rest of my holiday, I’m going to get outside more, have lunch on a patio, go for more walks and sit quietly -listen to the silence – and simply watch the day.
I’m not quite ready to surrender summer – lazy ceiling fans, open windows, warm breezes, glorious flowers, green lawns, tee shirts, shorts, sandals, ice cream cones and BBQ’s will be around for awhile yet. I know summer is fleeting and I intend to enjoy the days that remain. Cooler nights, falling leaves, rainy sweater days, scarves and jackets will be here before long. I’ll have plenty of time to sit indoors all too soon!
