scribblechic

Paperwork. Little reminders that the reality of a new school year is near. Old friends and new experiences wait on the other side of August, expectations as familiar as the smell of freshly sharpened pencils. School forms and supply lists are tucked stubbornly to the margins of our thoughts to stave off the inevitable and preserve the lingering days of summer for rest and play. Instead we invite excuses to engage adventure and we gather among friends to weigh our summer in shared memories; busy nothings and little everythings.

It is a summer of in-between and endings, new beginnings and familiar favorites. A season of nostalgia and anticipation, procrastination and pleasure.

I believe each summer possess a personality unique to our path. Some are rigid and conform to camp schedules and summer school commitments; other summers have been carved around grand expectations that lead us on more distant excursions from home. This summer has been an eclectic happenstance of travel and rest, education and nonsense.

There is a balance, here and now, of home and away, friendship and family. We loop together around change touching on familiar cornerstones of summer; ice cream and miniature golf, pool days and playdates. Quiet hours of late nights and sleepy mornings, punctuated by the noise of our friends’ voices. Tangled hair and calloused feet have worn a pattern of happy distractions and intentional escapes with a restless urgency. Temptation sticks to our thoughts like the sand that lingers against our skin, scattering the sunshine with messy markers of days squandered with joy as we mold summer memories from wishes and wanderlust.

I am under summer’s spell; content beneath a canopy of daydreams, my head is in the clouds. Early mornings unmarred by calendar commitments and intentionally choreographed adventures blur the hours between sunlight and starlight. Minutes obscured in the pages of a book and evenings enchanted by fireflies; time borrowed and stolen in a debt of gratitude for the simple pleasures of days well lived.

August is bittersweet with beginnings and endings. We turn the calendar ahead, celebrating our daughter’s birthday and begrudgingly note the dwindling days of summer vacation. The simple squares that map the month seem inadequate, an error in measurement.

Each day we hide from the dawn holding our dreams close and greedily gather the lingering length of sun stretched across our evenings into waking hours; defiantly we dismiss routine. School supplies slumber on lists tucked out of sight and our flip-flops mark the threshold of our home like totems of summer guarding against autumn.

I am not yet ready for the end. Instead I am slipping off my watch, marking off the minutes of summer with togetherness; scavenging adventures from moments of restlessness.

This moment, for now, enough.

We welcome the earliest days of summer with the cluttered noise of children unloading hopes onto an empty beach. Towels, treats, water toys, and sculpting pails map intentions onto a corner of a boundless expanse of possibility. This season of discovery is with us always, but too often we lose sight of the magic beneath the mundane lulled by the rhythm of anticipation.

This summer I have found new delights in the ordinary, like clouds performing shadow tricks onto a bright blue canvas there have been glimpses of something new among the old causing me to still myself, chasing after the shape of my children’s choices and marveling at the images they provide. Conversations like pebbles waiting for the tide and castles built without sand. A season of the heart.

Our first days of summer were a happy distraction of dinners, play dates, and dance overlapping in joyful festivity. This week the exuberance of these gatherings collided into empty calendar days stretched between penciled in plans.

My children take joy in carefree moments; lazy mornings and late evenings. Left to their own devices the minutes would pass unmarked by agenda. Still, at day’s end, they look to me with questioning uncertainty. Beneath masks of indifference I see the tell-tale signs of restlessness that begs a task or companion to contradict the independent stillness of solitary endeavors.

Acknowledging the fleeting experience of childhood summers I pledged to guard days of discovery alongside moments of rest. Not one to commit entire days to overly orchestrated plans I crafted a wish list of summer memories. Moments to share as a family that would sustain our spirits come fall’s routines; indoor, outdoor, inexpensive but often priceless summer traditions to punctuate the quiet. Then I scribbled my list of ideas into a promise, a contract etched into the chalkboard door tucked in the corner of our kitchen. Memories to gather like coins in a jar.

The past few days the words have tumbled from promise into action. One moment my daughter is bent over a concrete canvas, chalk confetti gathered around her form. The next, we linger over colorful treasures of produce and art at a local farmer’s market. Friends in tow or all alone we explore beneath the sun then curl into the shade with a book. This is my hope for the days of summer: nothingness and busyness in balance with self and others.

Yesterday I slipped beneath the sky and fell into the pages of a story. Drifting sounds from neighboring lawns were punctuated by the intermittent birdsong of a hidden companion. Momentarily suspended in time between dreams, I woke disoriented. My limbs were heavy with the warmth of the sun and a gentle breeze that seemed to pull the shade across my legs. I cannot remember a time when I was so easily distracted into absence in the middle of the day. The richness of summer’s textures lending comfort and peace in days stretched leisurely among hours unmarked.

It is the first day of our summer vacation and I find myself wanting to sketch our days in sand so that the tide might hold our summer beneath a veil of possibility. This is the first year I have not mapped the months with specific promises, inviting uncertainty to guide our adventures. As the days stretch longer in the company of sunshine I am mindful that my children’s years feel shorter. They are growing too quickly and I am suddenly hesitant to look to into a future outlined in expectations, rather I want to wake each day to a new beginning with a heart weighted firmly in the present and plans written in sand script.