When Summer Returns

Warmer temps bring streetlights that blink out like fireflies leaving the evening. Memories of plucking summer fruits blooming and waiting for hands. Balmy days of baking with Grandma in the kitchen, joining friends in the streets, playing baseball, swinging from ropes, climbing trees, crossing rivers—full, connected, grass-stained, airborne, calloused, and waterlogged.

Summertime memories also bring thoughts of food. Barbequed meats eaten in the backyard. Childhood lunches on the go. For me, it was a bologna and cheese sandwich with a cold, wet soda and pickle spear on the side eaten next to a pool, a lake, a creek, or a water park, it never mattered which one. There’s nothing remarkable about the meal. It’s cheap, the bread gets damp from wet hands, and the soda’s condensation makes the aluminum slippery and difficult to hold. Still, the meal is one of my most sensory memories of summer and it’s the only circumstance I ever imagine myself eating a bologna sandwich. In fact, I can’t tell you I’ve ever eaten one away from the water.

That’s the thing about summer. It’s not always the big vacations that come back to us when the air conditioning kicks in. Sometimes the nostalgia returns through smells, tastes, places, sounds—the music you played with the windows down in your first car and the vegetables your grandmother canned from a successful growing season. Once I started reflecting on my own summers, I thought of the summers described by former clients. No matter how small or big the moment, summer memories matter.

I wonder, when the end of my life calls, when I reflect on a life well lived, when someone asks how my summers used to be—will I still recall the damp bread of a good ol’ fashioned bologna sandwich?

Below are some memorable summer memories shared with us. Hopefully, somewhere within them, your own summers return to you as well.

“For the fourth of July, everyone came to our house. There was a row of lawn chairs for parents, and all the neighborhood kids sat on blankets in front of the adults drinking Kool-Aid and eating popcorn. You could see fireworks from three different spots right from our street. It was a great place to grow up, as we had everything a kid could wish for within those few blocks." Deb F.

“My summertime job was waiting tables at the Elk Hotel. I worked with these older guys who were waiters for life. Most of the employees were Greek immigrants and I learned so much from them. Dino was a cook in a mental institution and had the most unbelievable stories! I even went fishing with some of them. They had a shitty boat and little poles, but we’d still catch more fish than the fancy guys in their yachts!” 

--Nick T.

“My mother brought fried chicken and potato salad, which was a big treat for all of us. You had to eat the potato salad right away before it spoiled in the heat. We went to the carnival, and as prizes, they handed out baby chicks. Can you believe that? Live baby chickens! They never lived very long. When they got too big, my father, unknown to us, brought them to a slaughterhouse and we ate them as ‘Cornish hens’ for dinner." - Sandy L.

“Believe it or not, the summer before my junior year of high school, I went to summer school on my own to take American History and Government, all because of a great teacher, Mr. Clay. He must’ve been good that I willingly got up early to go to his class… in summer!” --Joe E.

“Dad would tow us and our cousins behind the boat on tubes, sometimes three at a time, for hours until we’d run out of gas. I think it was like a personal challenge to get us thrown off those tubes and Mom couldn’t watch. His ‘boat drink’ of choice was a can of Pepsi. It wasn’t until I was in my 20s that I realized he had been adding a little splash of Bacardi Superior Blanco Rum straight into the can all along! This explained a lot!" - Kristie G. 

 What are your favorite summertime memories or stories from a loved one?