Congratulations! We Made It! And How Do You Like That! It's The First Day Of Summer!

Ah, it's the first day of summer. Unofficially or as that old unwritten law goes, it begins with Memorial Day and ends on Labor Day. Like many of us, we spend our days in the tenements of an ever-present stagnant summer, with sticky fingers walking down melting tar roads, with nearby overcrowded mosquito ponds multiplying by the second. Only a few weeks ago locally where I live, a West Nile virus alert was issued. Ah, the times they are a-changing!

During the summer months, I almost always leave the car parked in a lot on the weekend mainly ride the commuter trains, El trains, walk within a reasonable distance, take local transit or ride my bike (when it’s working properly).

Most summers, the commuter trains are full of rambunctious youthful giggling girls, who bandy about with twisting donut shop stories with so many “like” and “goes” words inserted in them.

Then there are those young boys wearing Burger King paper-crowns, with strapped roller blades that hit each other across the knees and slap each other on their backs, making farting sounds with their underarm pits and screaming at the girls, such classic lines like, “Your voice is as annoying as a weasel meeting a moose.”

These are the kind of kids that wear death metal tee shirts, tan chino pants and brown cutoff shorts and always walk past garage sales with useless trinkets like Jesus bendable dolls, “Kiss me, I’m on welfare” cookout aprons, toys with missing parts, stained clothes, dog-eared novels and overpriced melted records with 30-plus deep grooved scratches.

Inside the middles of summer, whole gangs of young hoodlums creep about inside auto graveyards at dusk and before dawn each and every night, Junker trucks and cars of every make, model and color with smashed windshields, crumpled fenders, loads of tires, oily engines, ripped up seats, shattered windows and flattened frames, making future plans to rob the rich and spread the wealth amongst themselves.

Of course, there are the predominately colorful neighborhood festivals with gay and campy themes that permeate the land, like “KKK (Gotta) Love Jones Festival” and “Smoke Marijuana With Other Brilliant Dope Heads Daze” (sic). Then, there is the usual fare of art shows, morning songbirds up at 3:30 a.m., swimming pools full of kids and mothers with revealing bikinis, and carnivals and circuses.


Oh, the joy of remembering in my own youth, eating ice cream everyday and riding my bicycle and taking those daily dips into the city fountains. Summer holidays with gigantic fireworks displays. Catching lightning bugs and keeping them in a mason jar until you set them free the next night. Butterflies! The coolness of early summer mornings & late summer evenings. The marriage of ants and picnics, which go together like apple pie a la mode. The smell of morning green grass. Sweet corn. Lying on a hilltop and watching the clouds roll away.

Drinking an entire six-pack of beer with the porch lights out. Running through sprinklers with your clothes on. Old men walking their dogs their wives. Sons and daughters necking in movie theaters and parked cars with the windows all steamed-up. Short-lived romances. Catching up with old friends. Saying goodbye to loved ones.

Late night card games with new friends, accompanied with laughter and kissing hazy moonbeams with sweat dripped from foreheads wiped off by fingers and napkins and rags. Blazing car headlights and burnt out charcoal parties several hours old, yet the fumes still linger in the air. Car window breezes and late evening fogs in forests and marshes.

Goofy family vacations to theme parks and traditional American favorites in states like South Dakota, Iowa, Indiana and Wisconsin. Of course, then there is always the great idea by parents for a splendid summer vacation by sending their children away to overnight camp, giving children the fright of their lives, wishing and longing to come home and promising to be good.

Fishing and visiting museums with Dad. Band concerts and listening to top song hits on the radio late at night. Walking to the corner store for bread and butter and cookies and spending time just talking for hours with Mom on the couch.

Yes, dear readers, these are just some of the many memories within my soul that live onward. Enjoy your summer!!!