It finally feels like summer...

Aug 13, 2006 15:34

"In the summah, summah time / You can sit back and unwind"

Oh really, Will Smith? (That's actually Fresh Prince; but you say tomato, I say fuck your pronunciation.) That's nice until you get a job. No, excuse me, I had a job during my summer vacations since I was in the 10th grade. It's nice until you're out of school. What is that? Why is it that since I got my degree, every summer since just doesn't feel like summer. It just feels like a hotter time of the year. Remember that feeling you'd get just stepping of the last step of your school bus on the final day of school. You'd walk into your front door (then you'd pick yourself up, open it, and walk through it) and you never felt so free. This was the first day of the rest of your summer...

Yeah, I miss that too.

I miss the way that even the kiddie pool on my back patio cooled me off like nothing else. I miss the kickball games in the back yard that always ended in a fight. I miss the first summers that my friends and I started to drive and started to go places we couldn't (or weren't allowed) to ride our bikes to. I even miss that nervous feeling that would start on July 5th that let you know half my summer was over and I'd soon be in for another year of books and the politics of school social life. I'd give anything to get that innocence and safety back.

No, this is not a rant about feeling old. Nor is it a diatribe on how much it sucks to work. Actually, I like to have money, so work is good. Really, this is me wondering what exactly happens to that summertime feeling. Anyone with me on this?

I will say this though. In the last week, I've done some things that have given me that spark, if only for a second, of feeling like it's actually summer in Ohio.

Last Tuesday, I took my brothers to the drive-in. I feel bad for people that have never been to a drive-in theater. Granted, it's more cramped than a movie theater, you may get lost walking from the restroom to your car in the dark, and it the mosquitos are out, you're rocking the Benadryl and itch cream the next day. But there's just something about the sound of the gravel rolling under your tire as you find your spot; and the ability to, if bored, look around and watch other screens. Sneaking in your own junk food is also easier there than at the movie theater.

Then, on Thursday, Holly and I went to Kennywood. It's not summer until you've been to Kennywood. Screw Cedar Point, Geauga Lake, Kings Island, and, yes, even Disney World. Give me that big fag Kenny the Kangaroo, the smell of the fudge house as you first walk in, and the tingle in your genitals as you fall over 200 feet on the Pitt Fall. I love Kennywood and going there once a year is a requirement. We were there pretty early, and we didn't leave until the park closed. This was also one of the first years I was nervous to be on the Phantom's Revenge, as I couldn't stop thinking about Final Destination 3 and how much that first drop in the movie looks an awful lot like the one on the Phantom.

Finally, last night, I was supposed to go out and hang out with Joe, who is moving away to Canton to take a job with GNC. However, I never got a call, so after I got done with work at Cadiz, I ended up swimming up at my parents house (in the above ground pool...much different than our old kiddie one). When my brothers and I got out, we starting talking about old Nintendo games and broke out the N64. I spent my evening playing Diddy Kong Racing, Mario Kart, and Goldeneye with my brothers, in between making hobo pies and s'mores outside on the grill with my parents. It was kind of cathartic and made me forget that I'm 24 and working constantly. If only my dad would have been blasting some AC/DC or some ZZ Top, it would have been right out of a summer from the mid to late 90's.

What's the point of all this, you ask? I don't know, really. I guess what I'm saying is that it's not always good to live in the past because that means you're never moving on. But it's okay to revisit it once in a while. It keeps you sane.
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