I wish someone could explain it to me ó you know, the theory that the older we get, the faster time flies. My Norwegian uncle always used to tell me that “the hurrier we go, the behinder we get.” It didn’t take me getting too much older to realize the wisdom in that phrase.
Back in the winter, when we were experiencing one bad weather day after another, I thought spring would never get here, and, the next thing I knew, we had a yard full of azalea blossoms, and dogwood trees in full flower! Now, it seems, Memorial Day is past, and we are closing in on the 4th of July with all haste. I mean, really, slow down!
Over the years, I’ve heard many an older person tell me that when 4th of July arrived, the summer was practically over. It used to make me mad too, because as a kid, I loved summer, couldn’t get enough of it. School was out, I could play all the day long, never had a care in the world. It seems that as soon as the 4th celebration wound down, Mama would be packing our trunks for our sojourn north, to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for the summer. How my dad hated hot weather, and every year, we’d spend two months of the summer at our cabin, fishing and enjoying the great outdoors.
The day we arrived up in Michigan was always terrific. My brother and I would wander off to see the friends from the previous year, and Mom and Dad would sleep ó they had driven all night to get there ó then turn us loose, while they caught some shut eye.
Seems there weren’t enough things for Gregg and I to get involved in, a lot of it mischief. Take, for instance, the time my brother saw a pine snake slithering along the tree in what passed for our front yard ó just steps away from the lake, actually. Well, he whipped out that good old Boy Scout knife, threw it, and nailed that snake to the tree on his first throw. Naturally, since he couldn’t convince me to get the knife out of the snake, he did the only logical thing he could do. He went inside and woke our dad up to come and retrieve it.
If my memory serves me, our father wasn’t real jazzed about it either, as he had just driven 12 hours to get to our destination and was pretty tired. No sooner had Pop killed the snake, gotten Gregg’s knife unstuck from it and gone back to bed, we were off on another escapade, and so we passed the summer. Great times.
Well, here we are, practically to July 4th again, and I feel cheated. Where did the spring and summer go? I’m smart enough to not want the halcyon days of my childhood back. It’s impossible anyway, and according to all the great philosophers, yesterday is dead and gone, tomorrow isn’t here yet, and who knows, it may not even come, so all we’ve got is today. Only thing we can do is enjoy it and make the best of it; July 4th and every day.
This year, perhaps more than others, let’s celebrate America for the great country it is! I’m not going anyplace far away, but I will celebrate, I will remember all the good times, and I will enjoy the day, and I will revel in summer.