The View from Sugar Mountain

It's been sneaking up on us for weeks, technically for a little more than a month. The hours of daylight have already started to shrink and we're just starting August. The little boy in me (okay, very, very deep inside of me. Happy now?) always feels sad when I realize the getting dark after dinner part is starting earlier and earlier. 

It's not like I'm hurrying to clean my plate so I can be excused to go over to Neil's house and then down the street to Bobby's and call them to come out and play catch. Heck, if those two are in half the shape I'm in, by the time we get to the sandlot, it'll be pitch black. Life called on account of darkness. There's one for the record books.

Remember all the plans we had 'for the summer,' back around Memorial Day? This was the summer we were going to work on all those projects around the house we were putting off waiting for good weather. And how we studied the calendar to figure out when we were going on vacation because this summer would be the Road Trip to End All Road Trips. 

And what happened? Life, I guess. And talk about a seamless transition to rival the decrease in daylight: we went from planning that Fourth of July blowout to checking out the ads in the newspaper for back-to-school clothing sales for the kids. 

You know how there's that disclaimer on your vehicle's passenger mirror, "Objects in mirror are closer than they appear"? The same is true for calendars. Three weeks from tomorrow children will return to their schools all across our city. Ready or not, here they come. 

Quick tip of the hat to every single business on earth, or so it seems, whose been advertising for what feels like forever that 'Back to School' is just around the corner. And now it is. Talk about 'be careful what you wish for.'

As hot and humid as it's been here in Southeast Connecticut (I really hate when I break a sweat early in the morning not doing anything but standing in one place, inhaling and exhaling), I'll whine just as piteously (actually more so) in February when the snow's crisp and even and the temperature is hovering somewhere south of freezing. But the seasonal dying of the light saddens me, especially as I age, because I see life as a measured commodity and don't appreciate reminders that it flows within and without me, especially the latter aspect.

One of the Facebook friends I have (an acquaintance, as are most of them, at best) was observing the other day how grey the skies were where they are right now-which I think is probably a kinder idea in the spring and summer than in the autumn and fall since during the latter many of us peer at the heavens warily and observe 'if it gets any colder, with this sky, it'll snow.' 

Because they are considerably younger than I am, as are most people on earth, I didn't comment on the slightly disappointed tone of unhappiness they had about the weather and its impact on their family working vacation. You can't be twenty on Sugar Mountain, but when you are, you should be kinder than when twenty isn't visible in the mirror anymore.  

'Gather ye rosebuds while ye may.' If you think Robert Herrick is encouraging you to visit the Rose Garden at Mohegan Park, that's fine; if you haven't you should while you can. 

But my larger point, visible even when I'm wearing a ballcap, is Carpe Diem, seize the day, every day because you don't get any of them back. And ruing and regretting what would have/could have/should have been, benefits no one and time spent doing so is wasted. Make each minute memorable.
-bill kenny