So I looked at the calendar this morning and school starts exactly two weeks from today. WHAT??? Are you serious? How can that be? I mean, just last week, I, as King of the Room Mothers was putting together the finishing touches on the Kindergarten End of the Year Party. It was just last week, right? It wasn't? Really? I should probably stop drinking then.
Anyway, summer is pretty much over and as much as my child is ready to go back to school, I would prefer that summer never end. Even though it's 167 degrees here in Dallas and we haven't seen rain since 1974, if I had a vote, I would vote for summer twelve months out of the year. I need the pools to stay open and the sun to stay out and my tan to stay dark and the smell of grilled meat to stay in the air and the flip flops to stay right by the door and the sidewalk to stay hot enough to fry the bottoms of your feet and ice cream to taste unimaginably good at eight o'clock in the evening. It's always depressing to me when all that goes away and I usually go into a little bit of a funk.
And with only fourteen days left, I keep asking my daughter "What she would do these last few days before school starts?" and I keep expecting to hear "Let's go to Disneyland!" or "Let's go to the beach!" but instead I get "Can't school start TOMORROW???"
Freaking nerd.
When I was a kid, I can remember trying to squeeze every last second out of the final days of summer - staying at the beach until I was already an hour late getting home, playing pickle out in the yard until it was too dark to see the ball any longer, getting up earlier just to make the day feel longer, anything that I could think of to hold off that first day of school. STAY AWAY, EVIL TEACHERS!!! KEEP YOUR TEXTBOOKS AND YOUR DETENTION AWAY FROM ME!!!
Did you used to dread the start of school? How did you spend the final days of summer?
Jeff
(P.S. This post idea was totally not mine. I am so mired in not wanting summer to end that I couldn't even come up with a topic. Totally suggested by a clever friend who I will now owe...)
BABES IN JOYLAND
I defy you to find any man in his mid to late thirties who after hearing Belinda Carlisle's name doesn't go "Oh man. SO hot." Try it today and tell me I'm wrong. Just walk up to some guy in his mid to late thirties and go "Hey do you remember that chick who was the lead singer of the Go-Gos? Belinda something?" and his eyes will glass over and he'll respond "Carlisle. Belinda Carlisle. Oh man. SO hot."
Belinda Carlisle - Mad About You
We have very little summer this summer and I return to work in two weeks. Despite this, I got little accomplished. I am a giant slug.
Ain't fair.
Posted by: Patti Abbott | August 10, 2009 at 11:21 AM
I'm only know coming around to the joys of summer. I used to HATE summer. See, I always had my best jobs during the school year: newspaper editor, literary mad editor, writing tutor, etc. But those ended in the summer and I had to work crappy jobs. Very crappy jobs. So after spending so long in school I just grew to be a huge fall junkie and an aborhent hater of summer.
But now that I'm an adult and have the same job year round I'm kind of digging summer. I still can't wait for fall though because fall brings football.
Posted by: Bryon Quertermous | August 10, 2009 at 11:26 AM
The start of a school year is always *interesting* at least. As a student and a teacher, you get that "new car smell" for your entire first couple of weeks...but after Labor Day you start wishing Thanksgiving would hurry the fuck up.
It's hard to get enthused about summer because it's nearly over, the same way it's hard to *really* like Sundays because the next day is Monday, which bites, but (at least for writers) that's when you get mail again and those agents and editors reading your work would be more likely to get back to you, so...but even that fades once you have an agent and you don't have a book currently on submission.
So...yeah.
Summer gets pretty boring near the end of it. Also, there are lots of hornets. I hate hornets. Go away bad hornets!
Posted by: N | August 10, 2009 at 12:29 PM
Become Canadian - school here doesn't start until the Tuesday after Labour Day - Sept. 8 this year!!!
Being a lifelong lover of sleeping in, I hated the start of school because it involved a lot of yelling at me to get out of bed.
Of course it is raining and 64F here in Vancouver today, not exactly summer weather. Well, actually completely summer weather for here.
Posted by: gaylin in vancouver | August 10, 2009 at 01:01 PM
I grew up in a snowy part of Pennsylvania where summer lasted from late July to the middle of August.
Then it snowed. Or so I remember.
Leaving for the plane to Panama, I dug my car out of 2 1/2 feet of the stuff and thought nothing of it. People promised me I'd miss the seasons.
I didn't. It was always summer, always about 85 degrees with an ocean breeze. There were two seasons - rainy and not-so-rainy. Fresh fruit year-round. Girls in sundresses and swimsuits.
What's not to love.
(We won't go into the combat boots, 50 pound pack, rifle and radio humping part of that experience.)
So yes, summer, even with its baking, blistering heat and humidity you could fluff into a pillow. Bring it on.
Even as a grown-up, I never want to see it end.
Posted by: David Terrenoire | August 10, 2009 at 01:32 PM
Love summer. Love it. Although my daughter gets really antsy by the end of it and I know she just needs to get back to school and her friends. (Half an hour back from our trip to Paris, she was on the phone with all her friends because while we were gone, everyone got their letters saying what teams they're on this year.)
Posted by: Karen Olson | August 10, 2009 at 03:47 PM
As a teacher I can honestly say that kids have one thing right. Summer without school is so much better than the rest of the year with it.
Posted by: Jake Nantz | August 11, 2009 at 02:14 AM