I love hot summer nights - those nights you can step outside at twilight, even later, and be enveloped by the air, heavy air without a touch of chill, encompassed by dark humidity. I love the whispered promise of those nights, the stillness somehow alive with possibility, the hushed suggestion of romance and adventure, as though somehow, in the dark, all the trees have begun to drip with Spanish moss, to glow with flickering lanterns. l love these nights, perhaps all the more because they are so few at my little spot on the planet.
Finding myself surrounded by the magic of one such evening, I am transformed. I can hardly make myself head back inside, though the hour grows late and the mosquitoes bite. These nights transport me. I am in the moment, every sense on high alert and somehow swimming in memories of past summer's eves. I am a child, up past my bedtime, a jar in hand capturing fireflies. I am 12, a night swim in the pool before running into the shivery cold of the air conditioned house to wrap myself in a blanket and watch a made- for-T.V. movie. I'm 15, giggling my way down the sidewalk with my best friend to buy a pizza or an ice cream. I'm 16, camping out,my head thrown back as a meteor show rains in the dark sky. I am 17, sitting at the end of a dock on Lake Winnipesaukee, my boyfriend beside me, the boats bobbing and hitting the dock, my pulse racing inside me. I am 18, running across the suspension bridge at Cornell on my first night of college, engaged in the kind of deliciously deep conversation that only happens on campus. I am 22, a new graduate, daring to eat a peach as I sit, for the last time, on the step of my collegetown apartment. I am 23 sitting in Piazza San Marco, piano music swirling around me, romance dripping from the ancient stones, a few nights later sharing a sweet kiss on the Ponte Vecchio in Florence, with a stranger met only hours before, the music of a lone violin drifting across the river, the dark warmth of the night whispering of destiny, before running off to my hostel to make curfew. I am 24, stopping to listen to a Peruvian band that has started to play outside my favorite Portsmouth cafe, the windy flute carrying me off to another place, one I have yet to see. I am 25, daring, not to walk on the green at Cambridge, but to lay on it, staring up at the English sky, my head brimming with literature, weeks of poetry and Shakespeare my only priorities. I'm still 25, walking the narrow streets of Bar Harbor with the man I would marry. I am 26 surround by friends and family on a foggy Maine beach playing wiffle ball and singing "American Pie," the flower ring of my wedding veil still in my hair. I am 30, frantic to get out the door and to the hospital so my baby can be born. I am 33, jar again in hand, teaching my little son the fine art of firefly catching. I am 35, beside the Pearl River in China, red lanterns blowing, people dancing, opera music surrounding me, my new daughter asleep with her father and brother in our hotel. I am almost 36, alone, a destination in itself, sitting in the dark, crickets singing around me, a cat howling somewhere in the distance, alone to contemplate the magical lighting of so many fireflies, alone as my thoughts wander, alone in the mystery of a hot summer night, this one, and so many past.
I have always been drawn to this passage in a Farewell to Arms, " I know that the night is not the same as the day: that all things are different, that the things of the night cannot be explained in the day, because they do not then exist..."
And perhaps this is true.
But I still love a hot summer night.
Finding myself surrounded by the magic of one such evening, I am transformed. I can hardly make myself head back inside, though the hour grows late and the mosquitoes bite. These nights transport me. I am in the moment, every sense on high alert and somehow swimming in memories of past summer's eves. I am a child, up past my bedtime, a jar in hand capturing fireflies. I am 12, a night swim in the pool before running into the shivery cold of the air conditioned house to wrap myself in a blanket and watch a made- for-T.V. movie. I'm 15, giggling my way down the sidewalk with my best friend to buy a pizza or an ice cream. I'm 16, camping out,my head thrown back as a meteor show rains in the dark sky. I am 17, sitting at the end of a dock on Lake Winnipesaukee, my boyfriend beside me, the boats bobbing and hitting the dock, my pulse racing inside me. I am 18, running across the suspension bridge at Cornell on my first night of college, engaged in the kind of deliciously deep conversation that only happens on campus. I am 22, a new graduate, daring to eat a peach as I sit, for the last time, on the step of my collegetown apartment. I am 23 sitting in Piazza San Marco, piano music swirling around me, romance dripping from the ancient stones, a few nights later sharing a sweet kiss on the Ponte Vecchio in Florence, with a stranger met only hours before, the music of a lone violin drifting across the river, the dark warmth of the night whispering of destiny, before running off to my hostel to make curfew. I am 24, stopping to listen to a Peruvian band that has started to play outside my favorite Portsmouth cafe, the windy flute carrying me off to another place, one I have yet to see. I am 25, daring, not to walk on the green at Cambridge, but to lay on it, staring up at the English sky, my head brimming with literature, weeks of poetry and Shakespeare my only priorities. I'm still 25, walking the narrow streets of Bar Harbor with the man I would marry. I am 26 surround by friends and family on a foggy Maine beach playing wiffle ball and singing "American Pie," the flower ring of my wedding veil still in my hair. I am 30, frantic to get out the door and to the hospital so my baby can be born. I am 33, jar again in hand, teaching my little son the fine art of firefly catching. I am 35, beside the Pearl River in China, red lanterns blowing, people dancing, opera music surrounding me, my new daughter asleep with her father and brother in our hotel. I am almost 36, alone, a destination in itself, sitting in the dark, crickets singing around me, a cat howling somewhere in the distance, alone to contemplate the magical lighting of so many fireflies, alone as my thoughts wander, alone in the mystery of a hot summer night, this one, and so many past.
I have always been drawn to this passage in a Farewell to Arms, " I know that the night is not the same as the day: that all things are different, that the things of the night cannot be explained in the day, because they do not then exist..."
And perhaps this is true.
But I still love a hot summer night.
1 comment:
So lovely! And the pictures are lovely, too!
How was the picnic?
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