So there are two very distinct possibilities here. Either I complain too much, or summer stinks.
It's that simple, a complete sum-loss game. Either I whine like a 5-year-old or the season that, below the Mason-Dixon Line, plops its sweaty rear end down right between a very moderate spring and an incredibly temperate and colorful fall is about as pleasant as heat rash.
Which you don't get any other time of the year, I might add.
That's the choice forced upon you down here. If you love summer, you're a complete flip-flop and Hawaiian shirt-wearing, Jimmy Buffett-singing lazy, hazy days enthusiast. If not, sans an all-too-brief vacation trip to the lake/beach/country that ate your bonus and left you with an undercooked steak-colored sunburn, you'd just as soon get the whole thing over with and move on to more reasonable times of the year.
Guess into which camp I fall?
I mean, geez, what's not to love about a season whose sole purpose seems to be to give TV weathermen a chance to remind us "it's not the heat, it's the humidity," and lead the "when and for how long is it going to hit 100 degrees?" lottery?
And who doesn't love opening the back door to let the dogs out, only to be hit in the face by a wave of blast furnace-like air. At 5:30 in the morning. And knowing that's only going to get worse.
How about actually wondering if it's possible to sweat while in a shower? Or observing that if you get cold during the winter, you can just put on a sweater. But during the summer you're out of options that don't involve possible violations of decency laws, or at least good taste.
Part of my problem with summer is that it doesn't know when to start, and it certainly doesn't know when to stop.
In the South, all the other seasons seem to at least appreciate cosmic timing and understand when to leave before things become tiresome. Heck, some of them even take off a little early, like any good guest should. Summer, on the other hand, is the acquaintance you really look forward to having over, only to discover he just wants to sit on your sofa until 3 in the morning watching reruns of "Big Brother."
And what exactly is so much fun about the summer? Well, sure, school is out. But how long before the complaining, sulking and fussing start? And eventually the kids will get cranky, too.
How about a trip to the pool to cool off? Well, sure. Because who doesn't want to take a bath with 50 of his closest friends, including the one kid with the suspiciously saggy diaper or the other who hasn't been out of the pool for about three hours, but has managed to down six Big Gulps?
How about the lake, or, as I like to refer to it, the bass rest area? Jump on in. Just don't open your mouth or eyes. And remember snakes love the water almost as much as you do.
Of course, you could always just take a boat ride. If you haven't been, imagine a 12-lane interstate. Except there really aren't any lanes. Or medians. Or directional requirements. And none of the cars have brakes. But a fair percentage of the drivers have coolers.
How about yard work that takes on a road gang quality? Or the breathless anticipation that greets seeing your electric bill in the mail? Ready for fall yet?
Of course, it might be worth noting (and has been suggested by people who know me a lot better, including someone who is actually married to me) that there exists the slightest of possibilities that I might be, oh, perhaps, a little...wrong.
I drove home the other day in radiant sunshine with the top down on the car. Later we went for ice cream and in the dusk that seems to go on forever in the summer, we watched the fireflies twirl in and out of the trees.
I wonder if, when she's old enough, my granddaughter will scream with laughter the way her mother and uncles and aunt did when we'd steer the tube over the wake. And I wonder if all 16-year-old boys look up from whatever menial task they were assigned as part of their first job and watch the sunlight sparkle across a dew-laden, misty golf course first thing in the morning, before the day has even begun.
Ya, well...maybe I do complain too much.
Gary Smith is a recovering journalist living in Rogers.
Commentary on 07/17/2015