THANKFUL FRIDAY
Cindy Maddera
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I'm starting to feel like the official end of summer is upon us. Michael started back to work with students this week. The Cabbage starts her first day of kindergarten next Wednesday. There was a school bus picking up kids in my neighborhood this morning and because the parking lot of the school I pass on the way to work was full, I slowed down for the school zone. Advertising has moved well on past bikini season to the hottest new looks for Fall. The temperatures are still in the high nineties but there's an expectation that any day now those temperatures are going to drop and the leaves are going to change colors over night. In fact a cold front is expected to move through this evening, dropping our temperatures down into the low eighties. August is a strange month of transition.
For many of us, there's no difference between spring and summer and fall other than temperatures. For me, summer vacation ceased to be a real thing when I reached graduate school. Actually, now that I think about it, it probably stopped being a real thing for me in college because I continued to take classes throughout my summer. I am sure those times were a little more lax back then. I maybe showed up to the lab at eight AM instead of seven AM, but I was still at work every day. At the time, I was just driven and focused and really wanted to finish school. Once I graduated and was off into the real live world of grownups, I had forgotten about summer vacation completely. But then came summer campfire nights with friends and tiny little road trips that reminded me of those times when I was young and school was out for the summer. Every year, as all the kids get out of school for their summer vacation, I tell myself that I will also have some sort of a summer vacation. I will have more lazy days and lemonade. I will take advantage of weekends for fun and not chores. I will let myself fall out of my usual routine.
Every summer, I say those things and then pretty much only accomplish a lemonade or two. Falling out of my usual routine is the equivalent to me standing in the open door of an airplane. I may have a perfectly good, working parachute strapped to my back and I know the whole free fall thing is probably amazing. I just can't seem to step out of the plane because of that whole idea that I may be killing myself by jumping. Who cares if the parachute is perfectly good and working? This summer was a little different. I didn't fall completely out my usual routine, but I did fall a little bit out of my usual routine. There were a few more lazy days and even some spontaneity. I let some chores fall to the wayside (the garden is a complete crazy mess right now). I drank several limoncellos with tonic water which is basically like lemonade. And even though kids have gone back to school, I am still holding onto the idea of summer vacation. I am thankful for those moments of spontaneity and for limoncello with tonic water. Mostly, I am thankful for reclaiming the idea of summer vacation.
Michael and I have plans to drive out of the city to watch meteors and stars. I realize that the peak time for watching the Perseid Meteor Shower was Thursday night, but we don't really care. The idea of laying on a an air mattress in the back of Michael's truck while doing nothing but gazing up at all the stars in the sky is enough for us. We should all do one summer vacation like thing this weekend. Get out there and throw some water balloons or roast some marshmallows! Here's to a holding onto the summer vacation weekend and super Thankful Friday!