Summer

I lover summertime, and I love our front yard in the summertime. The three maple trees out front have flung out their leaves like so many sieves sifting the sun, green hands holding up the air. These trees provide shade over the grass until the early afternoon, and after a few hours the house shades the same spot, so it is cool and comfortable there; the grass is soft. The warm weather draws us outside; the shade keeps us there.

This summer has been about as fun a summer as I've had since I was a kid (probably, I'll never again have a summer as enjoyable as those I had between the ages of 4 and 12, because those days of freedom and discovery on the plateau lands in southwestern Colorado have set a very high standard). Part of it has to do with having a house and land and trees. The two summers previous to this one were spend in two different locations, neither with any trees nearby. I felt stifled and dried out. But now we can walk outside, walk barefoot through the grass and weeds, spend time in the shade, lie back on the ground.

Besides the house, the land, and the trees, I savor the summer because I don't work. I wake up with Elizabeth and the kids, we spend most of the day together, we put the kids down for bed, and the Elizabeth and I have a few hours to ourselves; sometimes we do something together, sometimes we do things in isolation, but the evenings provide a nice rejuvenating buffer between one day and the next.

Here are some of the things I've enjoyed most this summer:

teaching Sonora to ride her bike on the basketball court at the nearby park (she still has training wheels on, but at least she can pedal reasonably well)

picking vegetables from our garden with Sonora

walking through the yard while holding Rowyn (she likes being outside and seems to listen intently to all the sounds

watching Sonora walk around with her watering pail and water random plants (she even made a couple of flowers grow and then blossom in a planter we thought had nothing in it)

going on walks as a family

jogging every morning with Elizabeth and the kids

traveling to see family

eating breakfast, lunch, or dinner outside on the porch or the patio or the lawn