A Something In A Summer's Day...

I don't know where to begin, there is so much in my head that I am trying to draw out and make sense of. It is really truly summer now, and we are well on our way to those deep, deep days of summer... The heat has set in, the corn is getting tall, and the cicadas are humming. Lately, it has started to feel more like summer to me; a little more sweet, a little more lazy. Summer nights are perhaps the sweetest thing I can think of... Nights when the heat eases but leaves it heavy imprint in the air. Nights when you can lay down and look at the sky, and listen to the sound of the crickets, and the trains running by through the night. Summer nights are some kind of magic for sure. I'm not the first to have observed that... I know time is barreling forward but if there is a moment when it seems to have stopped it is in a deep summer evening.

I am putting off the packing I must do. Tomorrow morning I leave for Ohio to stay with my grandparents. I am looking forward to my trip. I am ready for a break from my routine, from this place, from all my worry and work.

Although, come to think it, I won't be working the rest of this summer now. Thursday was my last day as a Tae Kwon Do instructor, at least for a while. I know I am moving on to great and wonderful things, but it makes me a little wistful leaving behind the job that was so much more than a job to me. In all honesty, it's hard to write this because I don't think the fact that I'm finished has really sunk in. Everything has been moving so fast, and Thursday felt just like any other day at work. I shouted, and smiled, and frowned, and cajoled and encouraged, and laughed, and passed on what I have been learning since I was only a child myself. I have spent so much time there, and recently gotten to know all these kids so well, it seems almost inconceivable that I'm leaving. Yet, I always knew this day would come... Maybe it hit me a little when all the kids nearly tackled me in a massive group hug ("Now you can't leave!" they yelled), or maybe when the line of mothers hugged me gently and wished me all the best at school, or maybe it was when Jonathan looked at me and said, "I'll miss you. You've been a great help."
Although, I must say, the best line I heard came from one boy who said to me, "I'm going to make you on my Wii."

So much to think about. I can hear the business of packing beginning around me, and I must go. So, I shall end with a little poetry:

A something in a summer’s Day
As slow her flambeaux burn away
Which solemnizes me.

A something in a summer’s noon —
A depth — an Azure — a perfume —
Transcending ecstasy.

And still within a summer’s night
A something so transporting bright
I clap my hands to see —

Then veil my too inspecting face
Lets such a subtle — shimmering grace
Flutter too far for me —

The wizard fingers never rest —
The purple brook within the breast
Still chafes it narrow bed —

Still rears the East her amber Flag —
Guides still the sun along the Crag
His Caravan of Red —

So looking on — the night — the morn
Conclude the wonder gay —
And I meet, coming thro’ the dews
Another summer’s Day!

-Emily Dickinson

Breathless

Oh my.

Summer. It feels as though I am busier than I ever. Work, sickness, goat cheese, graduation parties, planning for travel, and moving out... One more thing and I just might fall over.

Last night I was driving home from work with the windows down and I noticed the smell of the corn growing at the end of our road. It is a few brave feet high now, and smells perfect... I love that sunny, cool, green growing corn smell.

In a very short time I will migrate up north where I will be able to relax at my grandparents house, my second home, and eat inordinate amounts of Ohio sweet corn.

It is more difficult, though, the more divided up you have made your heart. My heart is in that place, that house in Ohio. It is with my northern relatives, I do miss them so. But my heart is here too, in this place with my family and the people I have adopted into my heart. And I think my heart is already at my new college too. I love it there already, with it's beautiful white-columned buildings and winding walkways... It is hard, yes. But I don't see an alternative.

Oh my. I must go. But I will be back.

Happy Dad's Day

Things are just all over the place, both in my life and on the news. I feel a little dizzy trying to keep up with all of it. I am trying my best.

Today, though, I am going to make a pie for my dad. I think write this almost every year, but Dad, you've always been there, always took care of me, always been ready with a bad joke or pun, always been around to stand in the kitchen, talking politics and showing me how to cook at the same time. And when you tell me to make my own decisions (because I am something close to being grown up now), I know you helped get me to this point.
Thanks. I love you.