When you're a kid summer is the absolute best. No school, swimming at the pool, playing for hours upon end, riding your bike or rollerblading (apparently oblivious to the heat), climbing trees (and on the roof of my house in my case), getting Slurpees from 7-Eleven with your best friend who of course lived down the street from you. Plus as an added bonus, my birthday is in the summer. I loved having a summer birthday. I already didn't have school, so I didn't have to worry about that. I would have my party at the pool, in my backyard with little games set up like the one where you throw a sheet over the clothes line and cast a fake fishing pole with a clothes pin on it and your Mom clips little cheap party gifts, like plastic spider rings and rainbow erasers for you and your friends. My favorite birthday party spot was the roller-skating rink. It was the 80s and there was no better place than the rollerskating rink. I loved feeling the air against my face as I flew around that circle of wood floor paneling, in my very own skates, not the ugly brown ones with the bright orange wheels, that everyone else had to rent. I had my own pair. They were white with baby blue on them. They didn't have Care bears or Rainbow Brite on them, but I didn't care, because they were awesome. As I got older and better I could skate backwards and fly by all the slow pokes and win speed-skating races, even if I was the youngest one racing. Summertime was so carefree. I'd spend hours building a community on my bedroom floor where Barbies and My Little Ponies and Trolls all lived together as one. They drove shoeboxes as cars and lived in the Barbie suitcases I had. Such a simpler time. Such a peaceful time.
Then you become an adult and you have to work all year round, EVEN in the summer! What the heck is up with that?! If you live in Texas and you have a job that involves being out in the heat, you are either insane or you just must really love what you do, or have no other options I guess (or all 3 in my case). I have to get in and out of the car into the heat to go visit the babies I work with... or help. That sounds like babies are my fellow employees. Getting back into a car that feels like it's a volcano ready to explode, despite only being in the house for 45minutes to an hour, is absolutely ridiculous. I really wish we could close down, not the whole summer, that's not possible, but maybe just 2 weeks in the hottest part of the summer. Give us a little break. Summertime doesn't just suck because of the heat, even though that's the biggest part. It also sucks because all the awesome TV shows that I love, are on break and there's very very few options of quality programming available in the summertime. I can think of one- Orange is the New Black. But unfortunately it's impossible to stretch that 13 episode season out and I'm usually done with it in a week, maybe a week and a half if I discipline myself. So I'm quickly back to having nothing to watch. There is an upside to summer, and that is I get a lot of writing done. Last summer and this summer in particular I wrote ALOT. I had more shows to binge on Netflix last summer though. The hardest part of summer is being social. It's too damn hot to go outside unless the sun is completely gone from the sky and I'm not a club hopper or bar partaker, so it's a lose-lose situation for me. I become a vampire, unable to leave the safety of my home till nightfall... that is on non-working days of course. Work becomes more difficult and exhausting than ever before. You have no idea how much the heat takes out of you. I literally wear the same 2 pairs of linen Capris every single week, and then one pair of scrubs, but I really hate to wear them because it's too hot for pants, but I have no choice. You can't really wear the same pair of Capris more than twice in a week and I haven't yet found more Capris, or tried that hard to find them (to be honest). So not only is my social and entertainment life boring, but so is my work wardrobe. There's literally nothing to look forward to. Not even my birthday saves the day. It's been lame and I let it be for the most part. There's only so many times you can be let down before you stop trying to make it better. Maybe if I had someone in my life, then they would automatically plan something big for me or a surprise of some kind. That would be awesome. I did have that one summer, my 19th birthday. Actually twice, my 25th as well. Not coincidentally I was dating someone both times. Actually my 25th I had 2 guys wanting to date me, fighting for my attention. I hope everyone gets to experience that once in their lifetime. I never felt more visible. It was an amazing feeling.
Well maybe next summer I should just go to Alaska and be with the bears, like I've always wanted to. Go on my birthday, why not? At least it would be somewhere cool and different.
Summer is just the worst. I can't think of any really good thing that happens in the summer time. But maybe one day I'll change my tune. Maybe I'll move somewhere that only gets in the upper 70s in the summer. Maybe I'll get what I've heard referred to as "birthday sex." Maybe I'll be surprised with a hot air balloon ride or a little getaway cabin in the woods for my birthday, and I won't just have to write about that happening. Maybe I can actually live them for once. I am finishing a story I started last August. I'll be done very soon. It's probably for the best I end that story, the one I've referred to an my "alternate universe" story. It's time. I don't live in that universe and I never will. Even though that universe isn't so far fetched from the world we live in (there's no flying cars and people don't travel via big suction tubes); unfortunately it's not a world I could ever be in, as much as I wish it was. At least I know that summer doesn't last forever. Soon it'll be Fall, my favorite time of year. The cool air will blow in, the leaves will fall and pumpkin flavor everything will re-emerge from their dusty tombs. That crisp fall air and the crunching sound of dead leaves under my feet is just my favorite. I can't wait for jacket season. Summer will end. It does not last almost 9 years like my singleness, so thank god for that!! Whew. Thank the lord for that.
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