{"id":158,"date":"2007-07-30T08:08:21","date_gmt":"2007-07-30T08:08:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.wabash.edu\/fyi\/2007\/07\/30\/summers-over\/"},"modified":"2007-07-30T08:08:21","modified_gmt":"2007-07-30T08:08:21","slug":"summers-over","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/2007\/07\/30\/summers-over\/","title":{"rendered":"Summer’s Over"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jim Amidon<\/span><\/em> \u2014 When I was a kid, we would officially celebrate the end of summer on Labor Day. Public pools were open one more day, school would start on Tuesday, and Jerry Lewis was on TV for like 24 straight hours. And on that one Monday, the burgers coming off the grill never, ever tasted so good.<\/span><\/p>\n

Having worked in higher education at Wabash College for 20 years, I now realize that summer pretty much ends about August 1. That\u2019s when faculty members who have been away traveling or researching begin to file back to campus.<\/span><\/p>\n

And it\u2019s this week that we\u2019ll put the finishing touches on all of our summer projects \u2014 from publications to web upgrades to promotional work.<\/span><\/p>\n

I feel like I\u2019ve lost a month and have no idea where it went.<\/span><\/p>\n

In fact, last week \u2014 County Fair week \u2014 two different people stopped me on campus and asked, \u201cSo, how was your summer?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWas?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt is<\/u><\/em><\/span> going well,\u201d I said in both cases, hoping that by keeping summer in the present tense that, perhaps, I might squeeze a little more out of the calmer months at Wabash.<\/span><\/p>\n

And sure, we\u2019ve got one last weekend \u2014 coming up \u2014 before Wabash hosts the first of about 30 weekends of activities over the next nine months. But there really is just one more weekend before things crank up at the corner of Wabash and Grant.<\/span><\/p>\n

Hmm. How should I spend my last official weekend of summer?<\/span><\/p>\n

I could paint the bathroom, which I\u2019ve promised to do for almost three years. Ladders, drop cloths, and paint drips in the bathtub and sink don\u2019t exactly say \u201csummertime fun\u201d to me.<\/span><\/p>\n

We scraped the paint off half of our front porch in late April, so I suppose I could scrape the other half and maybe, just maybe, I\u2019d actually get it painted before the first frost. At least the porch is outside.<\/span><\/p>\n

I swore last January that I would dig out my office before the end of the semester (May) then said the same thing before my vacation at the end of June. The boxes and papers and CDs and DVDs and photographs are still piled everywhere. It needs to be cleaned up, but not on the last weekend of summer.<\/span><\/p>\n

I promised my colleague Howard that I\u2019d bring over my chainsaw to clear out nagging stumps and hanging branches. Summer work, yes. Summer fun, no. (Maybe some night after work when the temps are cooler, Howard.)<\/span><\/p>\n

In truth, I\u2019ll probably spend this weekend in the yard, cleaning out dead blossoms from the gardens, and maybe even grab a few hours of lake time. A walk through Pine Hills early Saturday morning would do me some good. Brunch at the Turkey Run Inn sounds fun, too.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll save the bathroom, front porch, and Howard\u2019s back yard for another time. Summer is fleeting, and I need one more weekend \u2014 48 hours \u2014 to charge the batteries for the coming year.<\/span><\/p>\n

But I do wonder what ever happened to the \u201cold time\u201d school calendar. It made sense to me to start school the Tuesday after Labor Day and go to about Memorial Day, maybe early June.<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not naive, though. I know the state mandates a certain number of class days for public schools, which when coupled with professional development, parent-teacher conferences, and normal holidays suggests the calendar has been expanded; summer has been squeezed to about eight weeks, 10 in a good year.<\/span><\/p>\n

All of this ranting is probably just my way of coming to terms with my age. When we were kids \u2014 and had more energy than the sun \u2014 summer seemed to last forever. When we\u2019re adults \u2014\u2020and really need a break from the grind \u2014 eight-week summers and two weeks of vacation just don\u2019t cut it.<\/span><\/p>\n

So for at least this one weekend \u2014 this weekend \u2014 I\u2019m focusing on how I\u2019ll spend my time, not how much time I have<\/span>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jim Amidon \u2014 When I was a kid, we would officially celebrate the end of summer on Labor Day. Public pools were open one more day, school would start on Tuesday, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"w_featured_image_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}