Thoughts about late summer

Winter observes everything with reverent attention”. The meaning of this vignette of Russian poetry is exposed in the late part of summer. It’s only when the intensity of summer repeateadly saps your stamina that you long for the somber winter when the rhythyms of life run more contemplatively. The yearning starts once the holiday period is over. Work and school start in earnest. We run ourselves ragged as the ongoing rush of Vitamin D to the head provokes an unsaid agreement for us to reject cycnicism and we loudly clamour to outdo each other’s levels of enthusiasm for overly-ambitious projects. Then we slowly realise our back-of-the-eftpos-receipt plans are snowballing. Rinsing off in swimming holes is now rare. The soft intoxiation of fatigue is ever present and while the exuberance brought by long hours of sunshine conquers vissitude, there is one pernicious summer pest that we cannot overcome by vigour. That pest is the great unease of the soul that emerges in the evening hours when the desire to put the children to bed conflicts with their complaints that it is too early. They run wild at a time meant for repose. They cannot be tamed while the sun is up no matter the thickness of curtain. What refuge is there for the permissive parent who respects the natural order? So bring on frost and chill and damp because you bring the quiet with you. Welcome old Jack. Give me back my evenings’ mediatative solace in the peace that early bedtimes bring.