Making My Peace With Summer

A post about embracing the light when you’re feeling dark inside

Summer.

I admit, I’d been avoiding her this year.

I’d staved off her sunshine and rebuffed the beauty she brings.

Why?

Because, when you’re down, the last thing you want is someone thrusting their gold in your face, right?

When you’re fed up, you actively resist what feels like forced cheer. You want to come around in your own time like an elderly dog post nap.

And that’s what I’d been doing.

Hiding away.

Summer can dazzle.

And sometimes we’re not ready for light.

But one day, as I set off to market, I found I could deny Summer no more.

First, she sent magenta flowers that scrawled the walls like neon graffiti.

Next, she captivated me with clouds of butterflies, from the carefree courtship of cabbage whites to the wing bling of resting red admirals and meadow browns.

Then, her flattering filter persuaded me that a patch of invasive bindweed was a travelling band of light-filled ivory bugles.

But Summer didn’t stop there in her campaign to woo me.

Keen to remind me of all she was, she daubed a wall with licks of rippling silver. All at once, the face of plain stone was transformed into an arresting marble tiger.

She showed me hover flies so slim and slight they presented as levitating hyphens.

She brought blackberry sized bumble bees with amber stripes so furry-looking, I fought against petting them. Wings with the segmented intricacies of stained glass windows. The way their flight defied their weight, evoked scores of shrunken black and yellow Dumbos. They gathered by the brambles, jamming their drone so fervently, it compared to cats purring.

Then came the perfume of freshly cut grass! My senses were now but a feeble fort about to be conquered by an irrepressible verdant army. I inhaled, at the mercy of this bold, green grip, a bewitching July laudanum.

Summer was on sizzling form, determined to seduce me.

And how she did!

I finally surrendered to her dabs of hot breath upon my bare shoulders, my focus softening.

“Okay, Summer, you win”

I conceded.

“I’d forgotten you could make me feel this way. I confess, I’ve been avoiding you.”

I said.

Summer took it in her stride as I attempted to explain.

“It’s just that you can be so intense, your light overwhelms me. Your heat smothers. Sometimes all of your brightness and warmth only highlights how dark and cold I feel inside.”

Summer tousled my hair with her gentle breeze.

“Well, you’ll soon have the other seasons to commiserate with.”

She said, sarcastically.

“The sweeping winds of Autumn, the cruel chill of Winter. You’ll certainly be able to indulge your bleak then!”

“And that’s the other thing……….”

I told her, remembering another pain point.

“Just as I start falling in love with you every year……..you up and leave and then I don’t see you for months! I just get used to your long hours of daylight, the brilliant blooms, the sound of crickets ……..only for you to take it all away.”

I felt a little vulnerable saying that, but it was true. I continued.

“If I never fully embrace you, then I never have to really lose you either, do I?”

Summer exhaled a sigh which met me as a faint kiss from wild roses.

“Julie”

She whispered tenderly, her sunshine dappling as she neared my heart.

“You’re 51 years old. We get to see each other maybe 25 or 30 more times, if you’re lucky. Maybe fewer. I’m not sure you appreciate how short our time together is.”

As she voiced it, my eyes were drawn to a flattened jackdaw on the road. Its plumage lay matt and lifeless. I considered how that very morning, he would have been just going about his day, rattling his throaty call, collecting earth worms and such.

Flying.

How he would have been flying!

Now, he would fly no more.

I knew that Summer was right.

“I can’t be here all the time, this is correct ……..but I always return, don’t I?”

She said.

True.

“In this world, you will lose many things you love, but I am a reminder that wondrous things can - and do - find their way back into our lives, time and time again”

I closed my eyes and felt her heat slide on to my cheeks to tease out my freckles.

“The fact that I can’t be here constantly and YOU won’t be here forever, is all the more reason to make the most of our time together now.”

She said.

I realised it made sense.

“Love me hard……..lose me……”

She murmured invitingly.

“Then dare to love me all over again.”

A lone blackbird with primrose beak arrived to hop happily at my feet. The rosy haze around me began to quiver.

“Yes”

As I lost myself in the arms of her strawberry sunset, I knew, I no longer had a say in the matter.

Summer, had once again worked her magic on me and successfully stolen my heart.

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