Summer Strange and Sweet

In some ways, this has been a strange summer. And in others, it seems just as summer should be. The strangeness began with the early closing of school – both the physical school building in mid-March and the release from remote learning at the end of May, two and a half weeks before the originally anticipated last day of school. The kids have been home nearly four months already, which hasn’t happened since before they went to preschool.

For large chunks of that time they have been left on their own to entertain themselves and each other. If necessity is the mother of invention, well, boredom seems to be a good motivator.

With no big trips planned this summer, no fast-moving weeks filled with the happy chaos of cousins visiting from California and Texas and Tennessee, no camps to attend – there are a lot of hours to fill. Some of these are taken up with books or puzzles or board games, others with screens, a few with chores, and some spent around the corner at grandparents’ houses.

The rest is time outside – alone or with each other, roping me in when I am not typing away or meeting-by-zoom in the hot office upstairs. We’ve had a couple of big hiking days, with more anticipated later in the summer. There’s the occasional bike ride. But for the most part, the kids have to find their own fun – or invent it.

For weeks this spring, after the snow had melted from the yard – during that long stretch of time

where we didn’t go anywhere or see anyone outside of our own family – we held daily 2 v. 2 soccer games late in the afternoons. We rotated teammates every other day and argued every call. It was an unwritten part of the daily schedule, a reward for making it through another day of school via Google Classroom.

In the weeks since school has ended, the kids have cycled through several rounds of self-propelled amusement. There’s a rudimentary rope swing hanging from the branch of a maple tree near the edge of the yard, and the skeleton of a fort in another corner. For a while there was an obstacle course climbing and twisting through a series of natural and kid-made structures. They’ve created a disc golf course and three variations of foot golf courses, weaving around gardens and through trees to hit the designated targets. The actual golf clubs have made only one brief appearance.

Only recently have we expanded our pandemic era circle to include a few friends. We hike through the woods toward mountain summits together, or meet at the river in the afternoons, where the kids skip rocks and choreograph synchronized leaps into the water.

Many days, as I make my way through working remotely, the kids make summer plans up as they go along. There is no itinerary, no set agenda, no schedule mapped out by the hour or the day.

But there is hot sunshine and cool, clear water just down the hill. There are bikes in the garage, hiking boots in the mudroom, and flipflops strewn across the front porch. There are trees to climb, friends to meet, towels hung on the line to dry between splashing in the pool and leaping into the river. There are books to read on long, lazy afternoons and fireflies flickering through the tall grass of the field after dark.

While we are missing some of our cherished summer traditions, I think maybe this is how summer should be, even if just this once – completely unmapped, unplanned, unbusy. Strange, perhaps, but sweet, too.

Original content published by Meghan McCarthy McPhaul. This essay appears as Meghan's July 9, 2020 Close to Home column in the Littleton Record. 

Barefoot Blues

One recent morning, I headed out to the dwindling garden to pick a few carrots for the kids’ lunchboxes and gasped when my bare feet hit the grass. Yes, fall color has been creeping steadily into the landscape and the sun is slower to rise these days – and slower to warm the air – but I was not prepared for the sharp cold of dewy grass on bare toes.

Bye-bye, bare toes.

I love the changing colors of fall, that slow fade to gold and ochre that precedes the brightening of hillsides to brilliant orange and blazing red. I welcome the crispness of the morning air and the season’s apples. I don’t begrudge having to don a cozy sweater during the chillier evenings.

But I am loath to give up bare feet and flipflops.

Leaving the shoes behind is one of the first joys of spring, when the days are finally warm enough to eschew socks and sneakers for sandals and bare toes – no more hauling out the boots to pull over thick socks before making even the quickest of trips outside.

Gradually, as the days lengthen, barefoot becomes the norm around our house – and beyond. There is barefoot gardening, along with barefoot soccer in the yard, barefoot walks along the river, and barefoot balancing on the slackline. Most trips beyond the house – other than hiking and biking outings – require only a quick slide into flipflops. Our formerly winter-white feet become tough and tan. Our toes revel in the feel of rough sand and smooth grass. Barefootedness is one of the best parts of summer.

I know, of course, that summer is nearly over now. Although the calendar gives us about another week of this season before it is officially fall, summer always feels as though it’s ended when the kids go back to school. They’ve just finished week three of the new school year, so I’ve mostly waved goodbye to the warmest season.

I’ve come to terms with the school backpacks hanging in their regular spots and with afternoon homework help. I’ve started to get used to the morning rush of breakfast and packing lunches and getting everyone out the door before they’ve fully roused from the previous night’s sleep. I’ve even found some happiness in pulling on jeans for the first time in months and cozying into flannel and fleece.

But giving up the bare feet and flipflops feels like letting go of the last little bit of summer’s freedom, and that is a hard thing to do. I guess you could say have cold feet – in more ways than one – about the next season, lovely though it may be.

Original content by Meghan McCarthy McPhaul, posted to her blog, Writings From a Full Life. This essay also appears as Meghan's Close to Home column in the September 13, 2019 issue of the Littleton Record.

Transitioning

These last few weeks, I’ve felt a bit like the tiny crocuses outside the living room window –  alternately basking in the warm spring sunshine and huddling against the stubborn winter cold. My first peek out the window in the morning now is as likely to reveal a giant flock of robins hopping around the yard like an army of wind-up toys as it is a fresh coating of snow.

During these transitional days, I am often as indecisive as the seasons, still enjoying winter’s last thrills, even as I look forward to and prepare for spring – whenever it might arrive.

On those warm-sun days, if I have the time, I weigh the options – an outing with the dog or one more trip to the ski hill for fast turns down quiet groomers?

When the day warrants time only for a quick outing, I’ve traded in forays through the forest by cross-country ski for slow runs on backroad routes I haven’t traveled much since November. I try to identify the birdsong floating through a landscape that was recently winter-quiet and to remember where I usually spot the first wildflowers – often escaped from some long-ago garden.

On longer treks, when the sun beckons the dog and I to climb higher on still-snowy trails, I can’t help but think ahead to summer adventures. Which tall peaks, now still blanketed in snow, will we hike during the green months?

The kids have had their bikes out the last few weeks, as the afternoons stretch longer between school ending and the sun setting. They ride over mud and snow, skid out on the ice, remember the exhilaration of flying downhill on something other than skis – and think about summer rides to come.

The ski gear is still out, in case we are inspired for one more day on the slopes. The ski boots by the big radiator near the front door join a jumble of muck boots and sneakers, flipflops and soccer cleats – any of them potentially required on any given day now.

We’ve lugged the sleds and snowshoes back into the garage, but haven’t yet hauled them upstairs to their warm-weather storage, lest there’s one more good snowstorm that merits their use before spring really settles in. Experience tells us that snowstorm could come as late as Memorial Day – or not again until next fall.

Some days I am impatient for the seasons to get on with their shuffle, for sunshine to prevail over lingering flurries. On other days, I remind myself any snowflakes falling now won’t last long in the strengthening light and lengthening days.

This, the dog knows – or, more likely, she just doesn’t care. She takes pleasure in whatever she finds, running gleefully along dirty roads, traipsing through puddles and scampering hopelessly after the chittering red squirrels. She stares intently through the windows at the newly arrived birds hopping around the yard. She laps happily in the recently-thawed stream near our driveway, trots mindlessly through the mud, and then – as if it’s the best thing in the world – rolls gleefully in any big-enough patch of snow she can find.

Perhaps she remembers that snow will soon disappear. Spring is coming. Next week, maybe, or the week after that. Whenever it gets here, we’ll be ready.

Original content by Meghan McCarthy McPhaul, posted to her blog, Writings From a Full Life. This essay also appears as Meghan's Close to Home column in the April 13, 2018 issue of the Littleton Record.