Last Rays of Summer

Summer officially ends on the 23^rd of September. For most children summer ends when school starts at the end of August. I think I’m safe to say that for most adults summer ends on Labor Day. It’s really one of the last holiday weekends when a grown-up can plan on taking a long camping trip or boating adventure. After Labor Day it’s pretty hard to find a good, long weekend when the weather is still somewhat warm for any summer activities. Once autumn hits, the temperatures will drop and the weather will become much more wet, making hikes and campfires all but obsolete.

So what do you plan on doing with your last long summer weekend? Catch up on all the television shows you’ve recorded on your DVR over the last few weeks? Or do some fall cleaning that should have been done in the spring, but you’re just getting to it now? Or perhaps you’re hopping in your car and you’re headed out to the Great Salt Lake to enjoy some peace and quiet out by the Spiral Jetty? I hope you don’t pick the last option, because that’s my plan and I don’t want anyone else ruining my peace and quiet. But I do hope it’s something similar, such as heading to a lake to fish or following the instructions on a map that your grandfather left you that leads to a legendary stash of bandit loot somewhere in the desert.

Whatever you do and wherever you go I truly hope you soak up the last rays of the summer sun. A person like me, despite my love for the wintertime, can still appreciate the summer and the activities that go along with it. I am excited for the weather to become cooler and the air to become crisp, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t look back on the last few hot months with a fondness for their warmth and the refreshing effects of a river. Now that I can look back, the unbearably hot days seem like a bad dream, and I am left with a handful of happy memories: a walk around Mirror Lake; watching shooting stars; hopping across large rocks to cross a raging river. The sole regret I have is that I did not have time to do more.

Labor Day affords me one last big chance at engaging in one more fun, summery adventure. That is until next year. The seasons are great like that: whatever you wanted to do this year that you didn’t get around to because a family reunion got in the way or the weather was terrible the weekend you were planning on an extra-long hike, you can plan for the next year. In a way, the ends and beginnings of seasons are like miniature New Year’s Days. You look back at the previous months, decide what you wanted to do, and make a resolution to do it the next year, as well as look forward to the coming months and resolve to do certain things this year.

As the wind blows through tall, dry, yellow plants and shimmering mirages reflect across an expanse of glaring white salt, I’ll be scribbling a few plans down for next year’s summer in addition to envisioning how I will take full advantage of this year’s fall and winter. Gazing out at the unnatural (though composed of natural materials) spiral that stretches out toward the beautiful, blue sky, I will remind myself how time marches forward and I must choose to either spiral outward and expand my horizons or be sucked in by the spiral’s pull and wind up in the center, swirling in place, going nowhere. I am certain I will choose to broaden my outlook and learn to enjoy more of what this earth has to offer. What a wonderful world.