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18 July 2007

Can you believe it’s the middle of July? Where has the year gone? It seems like February just happened. And wasn’t Memorial Day the week before Independence Day? Something like that? How is it 18th of July already? I haven’t had my hair trimmed, I haven’t done my seasonal rearrangement of furniture, and I haven’t finished a book since, oh goodness, it’s been months. And it’s already the middle of July. My blogiversary is today, and I could swear that I just started this little internet adventure, but the calendar tells me a whole year has passed. When I think about it rationally I guess it only make sense – I have over 300 posts and the list of things that has happened is so long I won’t even try to attempt writing it down; and I love making lists. Was it really so long ago when I was drinking from a champagne glass and watching New Years fireworks? 18 July, goodness time passes quickly.

Do you remember when you were young and the school year seemed like an absolute eternity? And then June 1 you were finally free to spend all day outside and stay up late playing night games with the neighbor kids? No more homework, no more books, no more teacher’s dirty looks. Summer would last forever. Days spent in enormous tree-climbing trees, making “the fort” down by the river, chasing the ice-cream truck, learning how to make daisy chains and weaving long grass into little mats. I was constantly barefoot with my thick hair in a braid down my back. We’d ride bikes down to the teeny gas station to buy a can of soda paid for entirely in nickles and on the way home we’d stop at the candy factory for a handful of sweets. I would skin my knees and stub my toes and my fingernails were never clean. I’d pick warm strawberries and peas right from the garden, eat peaches from our tree and let the juice dribble down my chin. We’d sit on the front porch licking popsicles and run through the sprinklers to try and keep cool. There would be fireworks and barbeques on the Fourth of July and in August my town had it’s big Town Celebration with a rodeo and a parade and a bakesale. The volunteer fire department would make everyone breakfast, and we would squeeze into long tables in the fire station garage and put too much syrup on our pancakes, bacon and eggs. There was always a big pool where you could try and catch Rainbow Trout with your bare hands and we’d always have fish for breakfast the next day. The city park was packed with booths where you could buy homemade hamburgers and corn-on-the-cob, or try and toss rings onto 2-liters of soda. There were hot air balloon rides and a dance and the Polynesian families would sometimes throw a huge Luau party that night, and the day always ended with fireworks. Summer would last forever.

Somehow as I get older time goes by faster. Summer is halfway over and it feels like it hasn’t even started yet. I spend most of my days in front of a computer, stuck in the middle of cubiville with no window to see outside, shivering from the too-cold Office AC. I don’t like the heat, and I haven’t climbed a tree or run through the sprinklers for years. And it’s already the middle of July – summer no longer holds the same kind of memories. Sure, there are BBQ’s and fireworks on national holidays, and a recent family reunion with plenty of homemade rootbeer and old fashioned hamburgers. But it somehow isn’t the same. Summer is a higher electric bill and more frequent trips to the car wash; faint-inducing heat and questioning the ability (or desire) to fit into last years swimming suit.

I am going to Chicago tomorrow for a work convention, and I can’t believe that it is already here. Our office has been planning this for months and months, in fact I bought my plane ticket the first week I was hired, back in November. It is quite surreal that it is already the middle of July. Goodness, where does the time go?

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