Those summer nights (a view from the spring)
A free ramble today. Please consider becoming a subscriber to access all 3 columns a week. All for the price of a pint.
It's spring. Well, at least in theory. If you can ignore the deadly snow squalls and relentless driving rain and the 40 degree in 12 hour temperature drops and the winds that are now threatening to kick start wildfires.
Baseball is back so it's spring, and try not to pay attention to the snow in North Dakota that has buried the first floor of entire neighborhoods because that might confuse you. It's spring, and Yankee fans are already pissed off and booing their team, and the Dodgers just pulled their future hall of fame pitcher after 7 perfect innings because of course they did. Yet another reason to hate all the cyborgs who make up that relentlessly competent organization. It's spring, and the Pittsburgh Pirates and Baltimore Orioles have yet to be mathematically eliminated and the Phillies 3rd baseman has already had to apologize for allowing the entire city of brotherly love to clearly see him lip sync the words "I hate this fucking place" after committing 3 errors in the first 3 innings of a game and being slathered with Santa Claus level Philly abuse. Gonna be a long year, son. Pace yourself.
But I digress.
It's spring, and it brings me back to school days. Being able to see the finish line.....which is summer. In the pre-teen years, before a job and other grown-up stuff awaited. When you woke and had the entire day to wander. To gather in packs or strike out as a solo. You were only tied to dinner time and evening curfews. Front porches and backyards and pick-up wiffle ball games and swimming holes with the rope already tied to the overhanging tree so you could swing yourself into the water. Or you could grab a book and go on walkabout.....finding a tree or a rock or a vacant park bench that looked ripe for dreaming. There was no homework, and no more cramming for tests. No more navigating the hallway of bullies. Everybody retreated to their neutral corners. It was like the minute between boxing rounds….that lasts 90 days.
But it's not here yet. Another month or so to go. Final exams crashing up against blue skies and green grass and a warm sun and way too many mornings getting up at 6am to secure a shower spot. Even the teachers are dragging ass, tired of the OCD and ADHD and whatever other acronyms there are for kids that are a pain in the ass.
So just a few more review sessions, a few hundred multiple choice questions, and it'll be on to 7th grade. Or 8th grade. Or high school, that vast building on the hill that you've heard so many stories about....a brand new world of pleasures and dangers and actual combination lockers you'll need to learn how to open and close. But all that can wait. Three months of summer feels like an eternity.....so the worries dissipate and the mind empties and the last 9 months of your regimented life can finally be dumped the way you dropped your book-bag after crashing through the front door all year long. You will wake up on the first day of summer vacation with a clean slate.
If it ever arrives.
In the meantime the classroom windows can finally be opened. Outdoor gym class noise drifts in on a refreshing breeze. In the darkness of winter school can actually feel like a refuge. The hissing radiators stopping your teeth from chattering from that long (uphill? in snow? of course...) walk in the dark. But now? It's more like a prison. Cracking the windows can actually make it worse....like giving the guy in solitary confinement a clean look at the sky. It's just rubbing it in.
It's your last chance to be noticed. This girl or that girl. Whichever one invaded your dreams the night before. She lives in the next town over. Bike ride range. If somehow you can catch her eye? It could be like that Travolta / Olivia Newton-John summer in "Grease"....minus the beach and making out under the dock because this is NEPA. Maybe the railroad tracks and the shed with the jimmied lock in the park. That would do in a pinch. Gotta act now though....and of course you won't because your wiring got crossed somewhere and you're destined to forever remain the guy in the yearbook that everybody looks at years later and says "I think I remember him...."
The spring promises what summer can never deliver. But it's still better than no promise at all.
In a bit..
—tf