Starting the season

Back when I was a kid late May and the end of the school year was a very odd time of year for me. It wasn’t that I didn’t look forward to summer vacation. At times there was nothing more than I ever wanted than to finally get out of the classroom and just get away from the boredom and busy work. But in a way the classroom was my playing field and now I was going to have three months on my own with no one keeping score and everyone being a stranger until September when we all saw each other again.

I never realized how strange that was until I got older. I had classmates during the year and in the summer they all disappeared. I’m sure most people had best friends and kids in the neighborhood that they hung around with but I never really did. I had my family and that was more than enough people to have around at any one time. And in a way even as a kid I liked being on my own. I could disappear in to a summer filled with books and game shows and a Commodore 64. I never saw any real need to vary from that world.

I guess that was the Catch-22 with school growing up. I don’t know if I can ever say that I really enjoyed it. I certainly was not one of those people for whom high school was the highlight of my existence. In fact, there are probably a few of my teenage years that I have blocked out of my memory banks and for good reason. But it was in a classroom that I really shined. That I was able to show just how talented I was and in my own awkward, often confusing way try to express who I am to the few people who cared.

As much as I struggle with confidence now I am miles beyond what I was then. I’m still not sure why I struggle so much. I really have achieved everything that I have ever wished for and a few things that I haven’t. Yet at the end of the day I still wonder if I am just a bit of a scam artist using a few math tricks to distract people into thinking that I am intelligent. In my heart though I can say that my life is exactly where I want it to be right now and I don’t know if that has ever been the case before.

So summer is a weird season for me. I look forward to the warmth and the light and lazy days that go on forever. I love being able to be outside with a book and a cool breeze and the knowledge that there is nothing to bother me. But I miss it when people go away for a time. I miss the crowd of friends. I miss the structure. Even though I spend all of my time in an office there is still a change that takes place in summer and you can feel it.

I just hope that one day I will be able to recapture those summer days of youth when the season lasted forever. As you grow older time speeds up. When I was ten summer lasted for fifteen years. Now it will be over before I even notice. And right now I just want to take a moment to stop, look around, and realize just how amazing everything is.