End of Summer

“I did,” I said, as it was going down beside me as I walked, “so nice. Always so nice.”

“But it was especially so,” he said, “end of summer and all.”

I nodded and repeated “end of summer.”

I’ve walked these streets long enough to know them in all the seasons, the way the yards when the bushes get dormant seem to shrink back and the street gets larger just as it gets more quiet. There are less people out on the porch sipping coffee, lemonade or gin and tonic.

Tonight, many folks were out in kayaks and on decks clinging to the skirt of summer before she pulls out and up her pants.

Are the sunsets better, nicer or are we appreciating them because even as we are sweating we know that the cold is coming?

“It was a good summer,” I said and I headed home in case summer was listening and feeling unappreciated.

I was trying not to be a child at the end of the day asking for another swim after a tired and sunburned mother has just packed up the beach towels. I was mad at myself for sitting so long thinking I’d have all day and realizing it was over.

Photo Credit: M. Bellafiore

End of summer. End of summer. End of summer. But it works the other way too. Sometimes we don’t appreciate the trials until we are through them.

“Here’s a secret: Everyone, if they live long enough, will lose their way at some point. You will lose your way, you will wake up one morning and find yourself lost. This is a hard, simple truth. If it hasn’t happened to you yet consider yourself lucky. When it does, when one day you look around and nothing is recognizable, when you find yourself alone in a dark wood having lost the way, you may find it easier to blame someone else – an errant lover, a missing father, a bad childhood. Or it may be easier to blame the map you were given, folded too many times, out of date, tiny print. You can shake your fist at the sky, call it fate, karma, bad luck, and sometimes it is. But for the most part, if you are honest, you will only be able to blame yourself. Life can, of course, blindside you, yet often as not we choose to be blind – agency, some call it. If you’re lucky you’ll remember a story you heard as a child, the trick of leaving a trail of breadcrumbs, the idea being that after whatever it is that is going to happen in those woods has happened, you can then retrace your steps, find your way back out. But no one has said you won’t be changed, by the hours, the years, spend wondering those woods.”

Spare, direct and spot-on. It’s written by Nick Flynn, who I fell in love with forever ago. I can’t resist a guy who titles his book Another Bullshit Night in Suck City.

Plus we had so much in common: work in homeless shelters, homeless alcoholic fathers, Buddish tendencies and a love of writing.

When my friend read it we were both lost. Our decades long marriages were ending. Mine had lasted a mere 20-years compared with her: three-plus-decades.  It was a time of comfort food and WTF’s?  We were groveling around on the floor in three-piece suits feeling way too old to be floored. Wasn’t that reserved for teens and toddlers or even 20-somethings – not middle-aged responsible folk who floss regularly and have retirement plans…

It’s years later. I’m happy and single. My friend is back with her husband and living like she’s on a honeymoon.

I read the same words now and I’m almost nostalgic. ALMOST. Lostness can be rich like compost – filled with promise. But when I was wandering uncertain I wanted answers, a path and a plan. All the Rumi quotes about welcoming every despair or disappointment as a guest were annoying. If they helped at all the soothing lasted maybe 13 seconds. Now I understand the words. But at the time I preferred drowning in a vat of buttery mashed potatoes.

Without lostness I can be a cautious, play-it-safe girl and won’t risk enough. Harrowing circumstances, slippery footholds and little to lose do make it easier to gamble.

Disaster rarely comes when we make a big move. Often, we’re slammed upside the head when we’re smug and not paying attention. This is not fun to learn but good to know and has changed how i live my life. Changed for the better which is why I’m nostalgic.

I hope not to be tested soon though. If I am I hope to remember that I’m still me whether happy or in pain and that the universe supports me no matter my mood or income. 

Photo Credit: M. Bellafiore

Today, I am grateful to be a dock, happy not to be thrashing or in danger of going under or pulling anyone down with me. If anything I’ve got ropes and life jackets and am happy to share them. But, I’m not diving in to rescue someone if I”m not the lifeguard duty.

Savoring and fortifying is what I’m up to because I know the ocean turns and always without consulting me so I’ve got to keep enough strength to weather a rip tide or to enjoy a sunset swim.

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