“Summer afternoon—summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.”
“...that sanguine expectation of happiness which is happiness itself.”
“Summertime, oh summertime, pattern of life indelible, the fade-proof lake, the woods unshatterable, the pasture with the sweetfern and juniper forever and ever, summer without end...”
“And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on the trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer.
There was so much to read, for one thing, and so much fine health to be pulled down out of the young breath-giving air.”
This is the season where I drink caffeine recklessly and let my worries sit on the sidelines for a while. I typically carry the perverse view that worries are guardians against being blindsided by something terrible, that they are bodyguards or fire insurance. But damn if I don't feel better without those bodyguards. I'm learning that opening my hands to let them go is a form of obedience. It's taking practice.
Summertime, meaning rose-gold skies seeping past 9 p.m. Meaning everything feels a little lighter, a little freer, suspended in a season of play. Meaning I feel most like my child-self, the girl I am growing up to become. I've spent years trying to get back to her. She's wiser in some ways than I am now; more curious, attentive, unselfconscious, a little bit too earnest, and inspired by everything new. Years ago that girl dragged blankets out into the backyard at midnight in response to an inchoate tugging on her still-forming spirit, and sat expectant on a bench. Stars spiraled overhead and solstice was still teething. She's here somewhere, still, recognizable most easily in this season of potential, when it seems like something surprising might happen any minute and I feel capable of transformation.
In other news, I wrote a few pieces in the spring. Here are my three favorites:
- A feature on immigrants who risk their lives and spend their resources for the love of families on the U.S.-Mexico border—my favorite story to write this year, hands down.
- A profile of ranchers who grow the best dates you'll ever taste (IMHO) in a desert oasis.
- An essay about questions, and how asking them of ourselves and the world makes space for God to flood in.