Endless Summer: no one wants to read about endings...

Who Writes about Winter:

My Thoughts on the Close of Summer

Endings are hard. They’re even harder to write about. Discussing writing with my young journalist daughter this week, I told her that the hardest thing about writing for her paper is you have to write something that the reader will stay with, that’s why the lead is so important. But you can’t know what interests the reader; you have to write about what’s interesting.

That’s why endings are frequently the topic of discussion, but rarely enough to hold the reader’s attention in this fast-paced media environment. The writer only gets a few seconds nowadays, either grab them or lose them. Closing a chapter, or the end of an era usually holds significance to those whom were there. For me thinking about a high-school buddy who died too early, or the end of a season is interesting, but not to one who believes the rest of their life is like a long stretch of road melting into an orange horizon.

Often the road takes a sudden turn, or the tires go flat. Until you’ve been caught by circumstance without a Plan B, a startling conclusion to best laid plans is not a realistic alternative. When you’re young, it always happens to the other dude. I graduated from college almost thirty years ago, but at the time it seemed the fun would last forever.

And so here we are at the end of another summer. Summer always offers mystery and adventure, warm weather, warmer memories, time to explore and go through the schedule on a relaxed pace. All the years of summer vacation affect the nostalgic way we view the balmy months of June, July, and August. The unique bookend holidays at each side of summer accent its special place in the cultural calendar, and of course I previously wrote about the special holiday in the middle (see July 4, 2016—e pluribus unum).

Looking back today, on Labor Day, my regrets about this summer do exist on a personal level: I now know that there is no “endless summer” and at the end of the road I often regret that I didn’t pack more into the opportunity. I’m happy that the rest of the family enjoyed some adventures and vacation, but my summer involved mostly work and some back pain. OK, no one wants to read about that, but a path without obstacles has no destination.

So the universal thoughts of this season turn to the weather, food, books, travels, smells, and the long evenings with friends and companions bleeding the last bit of light out of a long, wonderful day. You remember those days? We look back on summer for its freedom, the whimsy of celebrations, the adventure of the journey, but most of all for the warmth and fullness of being alive. 

Spring is glorious for how we wait for its colorful eruption, the resurrection from the dead. Spring is the morning of the year. Fall is self-absorbed, organized, and determined to achieve what we've planned. Fall is less about fun, and more about keeping score. Winter is the dull hibernation, the killing of one year and the re-birth of another. Winter is the end. Not much creative writing about winter. ##

©Mark H. Pillsbury

Finally, let me recommend some brilliant writing about this summer which inspired this blog post:

Thank you, Bob Greene for saying it with such class, may my thoughts merely echo yours…

He said so eloquently that the real gift of summer is that there will be another one next year!

http://www.wsj.com/articles/summers-greatest-gift-is-that-next-year-there-will-be-another-1472769683

Auld Lang Syne: It's January 2016, can you remember December?

Can you remember December?

In some ways the “memory” is more a part of the event than the actual happening, because it is the only thing we have left. Such is the way we look back on the frenetic month of December from the perspective of January. How did we fit it all in one month? So much of it seemed slow and gauzy at the time, and now it seems as if it flew out of our hands like the wind.

Now that everyone is back at work and re-enrolled in schools, the pace is back to the normal whirring, buzz of the high RPM lifestyle so common in modern society. If there was a chance to rest, reflect, maybe even refresh old relationships over the holidays, now the engine is back to cruising speed and the special holiday times are pushed back into the far reaches of our memory.

As low-key as I tried to craft my December, there was still a lot to remember and many good times with friends, family, past acquaintances, and celebratory gatherings. From old co-workers, high school friends, out-of-state-family, visitors, even parents, siblings, sons & daughters—the past month was a special time of building relationships, sharing joy, good food, gifts, cheer, and memories… But it’s gone.

Is December atypical? Set apart and foreign enough to be ephemeral, outside reality? For some, the holidays represent surviving immense pain, for others it is awash in oblivion, yet it is certainly different every year, and more unrealistic to me as I get older. 

Auld Lang Syne is "for (the sake of) old times" and each December seems to be partly that, and partly a pure money play for the sake of capitalism. As I wrote in my Christmas poem last month, what puts the wind in our sails is something entirely different.

We have a new slate in front of us on which we write the story of the new year. All accounts are back to zero-sum, the value has yet to be added, and frankly we don’t know which way to turn. There’s a feeling of renewal and anxiety balanced with confidence in what we can do, tempered with a healthy respect for present uncertainty; but describing that is like catching lightning. 

It’s the first month of the year, the short hesitation before it soars again, is like the silence before a sonic boom. Even seeing the object move across the sky silently, you wait for the speeding bullet to break the sound barrier.

How long before the average person jettisons their new year’s resolutions? Just a few weeks? Are they gone already? What do I want to accomplish this year? Just setting the goals is the first step in January; but the hard work and persistence required to make real change is the cold water into which we must jump. Good luck.