“The summer night is like a perfection of thought.” --Wallace Stevens, “The House Was Quiet and the World Was Calm”
Yes, I know it is still three weeks away and yes, I know some folks get really peeved when I name this time of year as the unofficial end of summer, but…. every late August the feelings for me are always the same. Maybe for you too.
We experience and want to offer gratitude to God for summer and all of the gifts it offers. We experience melancholy, at the passing of one season into another and all the gifts going away.
Summer thanksgiving?
For me that list is so, so long. Sleeping late and no alarm clock. Hot dogs that snap with one bite at the ballpark and cheering on a homerun as a pale-yellow moon rises over center field. Eating supper under the stars with good, good friends. Something off the grill and fresh tomatoes and corn from the garden. Riding my bike on a balmy evening well past 7:30 as the sun seems so reluctant to finally set. That first day of vacation and how the time that lies ahead seems to stretch on for so long. Finding postcards on a road trip to send back home to mom. “Having a great time. Miss you!”
What’s on your summer ‘thank you God!’ list? Have you started to write it out yet, pray it up to God yet? It may be time. Labor Day will be here before we know it. And a return to school. And increasing energy at work for many of us. And shorts and dock shoes that go back into the closet as fall jackets are retrieved. And the cabin is locked up until next year, after one final BBQ blowout.
Summer melancholy?
Looking at the assembled loved ones in the photo from the July family reunion and knowing that the next time we gather there will more than likely be a few old souls that have passed on to heaven and a few new baby souls to take their place in our clan and the world. By this time, the Red Sox baseball team that teased us all season has begun their September swoon and fall fade. Wait until next summer! Right?
Nothing and no one lasts forever, not even a summer that always seems to feel so endless to me in May, as the flowers blossom in full and the trees bloom beautifully and the sun rises hot in the sky, and it all begins again. And then before we know it, September knocks on the door and we remember again that summer is finite.
But by my calendar we’ve still got about a week left until summer starts to depart. So, have one final soft serve ice cream and risk a brain freeze. Take a plunge into the pool or the ocean then lean into the warmth of the sun on your back as you huddle under a soft fluffy towel. Sit out on the back deck and read that book you’ve been hoping to read all summer and read it far into the night, as the crickets chirp away in a summer symphony. Get the last of the sweet corn and the ruby red tomatoes at the farm stand and dig right in. Don’t spare the butter or the salt. Take a long walk with a friend at dusk and talk about everything and talk about nothing and just be with each other.
Then lift your eyes up and look to the Creator of summer, the one who paints pink sunsets and gives voice to the robins at the feeder, the power that raises a blue moon in an August sky. The spirit that invites us all to enjoy summer and the other seasons too.
It’s almost goodbye. Thanks again God for a great summer. We’ll miss it. Please make sure and bring it back again next year.
The Reverend John F. Hudson is Senior Pastor of the Pilgrim Church, United Church of Christ, in Sherborn, Massachusetts (pilgrimsherborn.org). He blogs at sherbornpastor.blogspot.com and is a resident scholar at the Collegeville Institute at Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota. For twenty-five years he was a columnist whose essays appeared in newspapers throughout Massachusetts and Rhode Island. He has served churches in New England since 1989. For comments, please be in touch: pastorjohn@pilgrimsherborn.org.
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