I’m not at all confident that this will be the last time I go for a swim this year, but it’s a definite possibility, and rather than look back a few weeks from now and wish I’d made more of it, I dove into the water determined to make a memory. The air above the water was chilly – the first notably cool day we’ve had in months – but the sun was out, still cutting through the wind that was suddenly picking up.
On the water, little white blossoms from the seven sons flower tree floated across the surface, and occasionally the perfume from the flowers still dangling above the pool carried on the breeze. All these vestiges of summer should have been a comfort, a sign that bits of the sunny season were lingering until the very end, but mostly it just felt a little sadder being this near the close of the season. We are less than a week away from the arrival of fall.
It will be sad to see this summer slip into the past, so sunny and warm and glorious was it, but most of me is ready. Too much of a good thing has rarely been a good thing. Nature knows how to pace herself, and I trust in the seasonal time-table she has put in place. I know a number of people who would love for it stay perpetually summer, the way the sun sticks around year-round in places like Southern California – and there are moments when I think that would be lovely, but those moments are almost always at the tail-end of winter, just as the wondrous cycle of spring is about to begin.
Right now, the idea of nine more months of summer feels stale and stagnant, and I’m ok with turning to the next seasonal page. After this one last dip…
