Chronicles of Chaos

June 8, 2011 | Print

Summer Slowly

Today is the last day of school and I’m thrilled. The kids and I need to go nowhere for awhile–right now I think we could do nothing for the entire summer.  Allegra Goodman (The Cookbook Collector) wrote a short story “La Vita Nuovo” about a young woman looking after a boy one summer in Boston. The first day they decide to do nothing and from there whimsically explore the city, eating ice cream, riding the T, walking along the river. Their freedom reads like a fairy tale.

For some kids, camps are a great escape, an adventure from routine. We fall into the one or two week of camp max category. The rest of the days we hold a loose schedule of waking up, checking our energy level and then formulating a plan. We bike, hike, take swim lessons, go to the library, make picnics. Often summer themes develop, last year most days we walked our puppy to the coffee shop for late morning eggs and afternoons rode bikes up and down the same hill.

I book some babysitting time, play days with other kids to keep the mood positive. The kids still fight and they also build forts. We go to bed a little later and wake up slower. And as much as I can’t wait to begin, by the end of August I will long for the arrival of the morning school bus. Summer is perfect that way.

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