June
June is the Kevin Maas of months. The Blaine Lacher, or the Bob Grim if you will. The month that comes up as the outstanding rookie with so much promise and high expectations that develop into much, much less than you would expect.
This occurred to me as I was sitting outside yesterday, cold pilsner in hand staring up at a baby blue sky watching far-off jets arc and turn toward and away from the local airports. It was a perfect day. Warm but not too warm. Breezy but not overly so. Just the right amount of humidity. It was, in short the sort of day that makes you think you love the summertime. The sort of day that makes you say “Wow, I can’t believe we’re doing to have three or four months of this great weather now!” The sort of day that is, ultimately, the total fakeout for the young and inexperienced. The people that haven’t seen this movie before.
Anticipation is high this time of year. It’s been warmer for a bit but not terribly hot and humid. School is winding down and if you’re a kid you’re looking longingly out the window and you’re just about ready to burst with the excitement of ten weeks off. Ten weeks! To a kid that’s roughly the equivalent of ten years to someone in middle age.
If you’re a grown up, you’re hip deep in summer vacation plans and excited as you think back on all the great times and travels you’ve had. It’s the time of year where you remember the great nights in the restaurants and at the water’s edge or in the mountains and you forget about the endless hours in an airport or circling on a plane or being soaked in the pissing rain hustling from point A to point B or the nightmarish traffic getting to the shore or getting the mountains or getting to wherever. Summer is all still ahead of you. Nothing has gone wrong yet. This year will be different, you tell yourself. This year will be perfect. You’ve learned your lessons. You’ve made contingency plans. It will go off without a hitch.
June lies a lot. If April is the cruelest month, June is a flat-out two-faced bitch.
June doesn’t tell you about the oppressive humidity of July and August. June doesn’t remind you that the city smells like piss and worse for two months, the horrifying air quality in urban centers clogging your lungs until you gasp. June doesn’t tell you that in July you won’t be sitting outside in the evening staring at those planes because the bugs will eat you alive. June doesn’t remind you of the hurricanes to come. The blackouts. The sweltering hell of the subways. The heat rash and dehydration. The fact that after that beautiful midsummer’s night right in the heart of June that it starts getting dark early again, that winter has begun creeping in even as Americans char up some flesh in honor of the nation’s birthday.
No, June whispers sweetly in our ears and we smile and listen even though we know better. We know in our heart of heart’s what’s coming down the pike because the seasons are the same every year. But we listen because it is stunning on its own. We listen for that one perfect moment that makes the rest of the dreary business of getting on with it worthwhile. We listen because otherwise we’ll miss that baby blue sky instant of being precisely alive in the moment. Once that moment is gone, it’s gone for a year, or forever and you never know which.
This occurred to me as I was sitting outside yesterday, cold pilsner in hand staring up at a baby blue sky watching far-off jets arc and turn toward and away from the local airports. It was a perfect day. Warm but not too warm. Breezy but not overly so. Just the right amount of humidity. It was, in short the sort of day that makes you think you love the summertime. The sort of day that makes you say “Wow, I can’t believe we’re doing to have three or four months of this great weather now!” The sort of day that is, ultimately, the total fakeout for the young and inexperienced. The people that haven’t seen this movie before.
Anticipation is high this time of year. It’s been warmer for a bit but not terribly hot and humid. School is winding down and if you’re a kid you’re looking longingly out the window and you’re just about ready to burst with the excitement of ten weeks off. Ten weeks! To a kid that’s roughly the equivalent of ten years to someone in middle age.
If you’re a grown up, you’re hip deep in summer vacation plans and excited as you think back on all the great times and travels you’ve had. It’s the time of year where you remember the great nights in the restaurants and at the water’s edge or in the mountains and you forget about the endless hours in an airport or circling on a plane or being soaked in the pissing rain hustling from point A to point B or the nightmarish traffic getting to the shore or getting the mountains or getting to wherever. Summer is all still ahead of you. Nothing has gone wrong yet. This year will be different, you tell yourself. This year will be perfect. You’ve learned your lessons. You’ve made contingency plans. It will go off without a hitch.
June lies a lot. If April is the cruelest month, June is a flat-out two-faced bitch.
June doesn’t tell you about the oppressive humidity of July and August. June doesn’t remind you that the city smells like piss and worse for two months, the horrifying air quality in urban centers clogging your lungs until you gasp. June doesn’t tell you that in July you won’t be sitting outside in the evening staring at those planes because the bugs will eat you alive. June doesn’t remind you of the hurricanes to come. The blackouts. The sweltering hell of the subways. The heat rash and dehydration. The fact that after that beautiful midsummer’s night right in the heart of June that it starts getting dark early again, that winter has begun creeping in even as Americans char up some flesh in honor of the nation’s birthday.
No, June whispers sweetly in our ears and we smile and listen even though we know better. We know in our heart of heart’s what’s coming down the pike because the seasons are the same every year. But we listen because it is stunning on its own. We listen for that one perfect moment that makes the rest of the dreary business of getting on with it worthwhile. We listen because otherwise we’ll miss that baby blue sky instant of being precisely alive in the moment. Once that moment is gone, it’s gone for a year, or forever and you never know which.
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