Magenta Chicken | No. 5
A Summer List
I’m sitting here looking at my deck. It’s June. Summer has started. And my deck is empty. This time last year I already had my first tiny tomatoes and a not-so-small forest of plants soaking up the June sunshine.
I’ve delayed everything this year. A combination of intention (No Mow May), injury (lifting things I cannot lift), travel, and illness (my hacking annoying even the cedar waxwings in the tree above me) has put me in this uncomfortable world of Not Yet.
Truth is summer has progressively broken my heart since we moved to Provincetown. The throngs of humanity, the heat my body can no longer tolerate, the sense of jostling for space in someone else’s fantasy summer vacation have all taken a toll on my longtime love affair with my favorite season in my favorite place.
However, the weather was just perfect the weekend before I got sick. The crowds were humming, not screaming. We easily claimed our corner spot outside on the rail at Pepe’s. I sat at the pool sipping my usual blue Pool Boy, the sun lightly toasting my sun-screened skin and I thought, “I remember this. This is the feeling I love so much.”
And then we all got COVID, bringing the joy to a screeching halt. I’ve been cursing the Simulation Overlords for providing yet another ill-timed confluence of obstacles to manage, the banishment to Not Yet making me feel stabby.
But it’s given me time to sit, to stare, to watch the birds who could care less about my plant-less deck situation (as long as I bring them jelly every morning.) And I’ve been thinking about what I really want out of this summer. Like every year, I yearn for the long care-free summer days of my youth. The sense of time expanding and slowing down. The feeling of that.
My expectations for summer are always sky high. I feel stressed if I’m not checking things off the list at a good clip. Summer feels like a scarce resource. There is only so much of it and only so many good days to do all the things.
So I came up with a different kind of summer list — a short list of do’s and don’ts to protect my peace, hold space for myself, and help me find that feeling.
Go outside.
Summer happens out there. Nature heals.Take it slow and go at my own pace.
FOMO-ing my way through my favorite season is a sure-fire way of making me hate it. It’s the slowness and the serendipity that allows for the magic.Embrace the early morning.
The good stuff happens before the throngs awake.
Interact with the ocean in some way most days.
People who live at the beach don’t go to the beach. And that is tragic.Find summer in the little things.
The scent of tomato leaves, the streaks of orange and pink I can see from my deck as the day ends, the glow of fireflies in the yard, warm salt pine breezes, the warmth of the sun on my face.Don’t try to suspend real life.
I still have to go to the dentist, do the laundry, and clean the house. Summer does not magically make that go away. Let that fantasy go.Don’t eat vacation food all summer.
257 lobster rolls is too many.Don’t just wear tshirts and shorts every day.
I have a whole closet of fun resort clothes.Don’t be a slave to my plants.
I will not drag them around the deck and in and out of the house this year. If the storms or the heat get them, so be it.Don’t worry about what anyone else is doing, keep my compass turned inward.
So much happens in this town at any moment and you cannot possibly be everywhere all the time. Miss Instagram keeps telling me I missed it. She’s due for a very long nap (except my Sunday stories, I’ll still do those.) And, as we like to say here, I’m not on your vacation.
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Currently reading: Peace is Every Step, Thich Nhat Hanh