Tag: Summer

Summertime Magic

I still remember the satisfying feeling brought on by cleaning all the papers out of my desk and tossing them directly into the trash on the last day of school — no need to so much as glance at any of them. The day’s rising heat brought with it the promise of beach days, long, lazy afternoons punctuated by grape Popsicles, and running leaps through the backyard sprinkler. 

Summer meant visits from the neighborhood ice cream truck, rainbow-colored snow cones, and clusters of sweaty kids clutching damp dollar bills. My sister and I raced around the neighborhood on our bikes (no helmets! no shoes!), completely disregarded all advice regarding sunscreen, and stayed up well past our bedtime every night waiting for the sun to finally go down. Everything we did seemed to have an aura of magic to it.

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about that magic and how I might try to recapture some of it.

When I was growing up, my friends and I were fully present during our summer vacations, no matter what we were doing. We weren’t thinking about all the chores we were supposed to do or that school was starting soon. Whether we were playing kickball with the neighborhood kids, making Italian ice runs to the corner store, or just hanging out on the porch trying to keep cool, that time was ours. We weren’t going to let anyone or anything take it away from us.

It’s rare these days to have any amount of time that’s truly our own. We’re accessible 24/7 on our phones. Our attention is constantly being drawn in ten directions at once by television monitors, emails, the daily news cycle. We’re always worried about the state of our country, the possibility of war, corrupt, evil politicians, the bills we have to pay, the kind of world we’ll leave behind for our kids.

All of those things are pressing, but they’re not going away, at least not anytime soon.

Summer is fleeting. It’s time we took all took a step back and carved out some time to enjoy the smell of freshly cut grass, the way the air smells when a sudden rainstorm hits the hot pavement. We can count the fireflies as they hover and flash on summer nights, and wake up early to hear the songs of morning birds.

We can dig holes in the sand and eat ice cream cones, read novels, stare at the sky, turn the music up loud in the car. We can do whatever we want if we let ourselves, even if it’s just for an hour or a lunch break or between phone calls. It doesn’t even need to cost anything.

The magic is still out there. Go and find it.

ENP

The Chairs of Summer

Over the past few years, my husband and I have spent several weekends at the Eagle Mountain House in Jackson, New Hampshire. We began staying at the hotel because it’s close to many of the places we like to go hiking. One of the best things about the hotel, built in 1879, is its enormous wrap-around front porch lined with wooden rocking chairs.

As we sipped coffee on the hotel’s porch on a recent Sunday morning, I started thinking about these chairs: the generations of summer visitors who have sat in them; the conversations they’ve had; the marriage proposals; the breaking of bad news; the cocktails people have enjoyed while taking in the mountain views.

Eagle Mountain’s sturdy rockers reminded me of similar ones on the porch of the historic Gosport Hotel on Star Island, located off the coast of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. I spent several summers hanging out in these chairs growing up. As much as my life changed over those years, the chairs, solid and hard-worn, were always the same.

At the house where I lived as a kid, we had a set of heavy wooden outdoor chairs with removable vinyl cushions. Hand-me-downs from a family member who no longer wanted them, these chairs were monstrosities. It took two adults to move one. The cushions soaked up rainwater like sponges, and if you happened to stub a toe on one of the chairs’ legs, you’d be hopping around for ten minutes, howling. When my friends came over, we usually sat on the lawn.

The first summer I lived on my own, after graduating from college, I bought two green plastic chairs at a hardware store. I lived in Boston and didn’t have a car, so I carried them the three blocks back to my apartment. My roommate and I put the chairs out on our miniature back porch, which overlooked the kitchen of a Chinese restaurant. We spent much of that summer sitting in them while grilling burgers on our rickety hibachi and drinking gin and tonics out of plastic cups.

My husband bought me a foldable canvas sand chair with the Rolling Rock beer logo on it—a promotional item he’d found at a liquor store—when I was pregnant with our daughter. It’s one of the most comfortable beach chairs I’ve owned, but as that summer wore on and my belly grew bigger, I frequently needed his help to get out of it and back into a standing position.

When our daughter was a toddler, we got her a pint-size white resin chair, just the right size for a two-year-old. She used to like to sit outside in it to eat lunch, a 5-gallon bucket serving as her dining table. We were living in our first house at the time. When we sold it we got rid of most of our outdoor furniture, but not that chair. She’ll be 25 this year, and that little seat is still stored up in the rafters of our garage.

For a number of summers, my husband complained about the fact that it’s nearly impossible to find the old fashioned aluminum-frame chairs—the foldable kind with backs and seats woven from vinyl straps—that his parents had when he was growing up. Several years ago, quite by accident, my daughter and I found these chairs for sale at a discount store, and bought one for him for Father’s Day. As a surprise, we put a fancy bow on the chair and set it up in the middle of the garage so he’d find it when he took the trash out. Its metal frame digs into the back of your legs after you’ve been sitting in it for a while, but it’s still the only chair he uses whenever we host a barbecue.

We’ve wiled away many pleasant summer afternoons in the four red plastic Adirondack chairs we bought when we moved into the house where we live now. But they only seem to last a season or two before they have to be replaced. We’re down to two of these chairs now—both sure to break soon. We’re not home a lot on weekends anymore, so we still haven’t decided what to replace them with.

Weighing a mere two pounds each and folding neatly into custom carrying cases, our newest summer chairs are stored in the back of our car. Made of polyester mesh and steel, these two comfy high-tech seats are ideal for relaxing and enjoying drinks and snacks after a long hike. They weren’t inexpensive, but they were worth every penny.

Note: A version of this essay appeared in the July/August 2021 issue of Merrimack Valley Magazine.

ENP

*NO AI TRAINING