Since this summer will most likely be the last one I get to savor fully (for the time being), the next the one I plan to cap off my college experience with Something Very Big and Probably Spontaneous. Summer has always been a reprieve. It is the silver lining on the haze of the rest of the year. So much can happen in the space of three months--and it can be anything.
The summer between junior high and high school, my friend Jael and I made a pact to prepare for high school. As far as we were concerned, there was a set of guidelines to follow. The top of the list was that high school girls had tans. So, we went to the pool every day for two weeks to sit in the sun for an hour to build one up--and I remember having a very mild one across my shoulders. The day I finished eighth grade, I felt different. For the rest of the summer, I spent my free time reading, working on the first two pencil drawings I knew would be due for my first high school art class. I wrote a lot that summer. I had finished that novella that I'm now slightly ashamed of. I started my second novel idea--which I have never finished to this day. The soundtrack that summer was Vanessa Carlton's "Be Not Nobody," a CD I listened to over and over as I was writing though at the time I didn't like most of the songs on the album. I made an over-the-shoulder bookbag from an old canvas Boogarts shopping bag, using a leopard striped seatbelt shoulder thing as part of the strap. I dieted the whole summer after talking to a dietician, walking every morning with my mom and keeping track of my calorie intake. We would sit out on the porch after our return to eat breakfast. I tried to get into a beauty regime. The diet, the tan, and Neutrogena were my passes to impressing boys and the rest of the student body. I don't think it actually worked, but at the time I had hope.
That was the summer after Grandpapa passed away, the one before the last summer we saw Grandmama before she died. I looked through Grammy's photo albums for pictures I wanted to draw for art, finding a stack that I worked my way through. I carried around two sketchbooks and a stack of magazines (mostly relating to Harry Potter) that I drew from. Apart from the family stuff and our Michigan trip, I spent a lot of time by myself, reading, drawing, writing, watching music videos, thinking.....I remember sitting in the living room one afternoon, staring out the screen of the front door, willing someone to come over. Though I appreciate now the time I had to ponder, to prepare myself for what would come, I should have involved myself more. But there was hardly anyone left to involve myself with, because the end of eighth grade was such a grand disaster.
I did, however, get involved in some form during the summers, though it varied depending on the particular summer. For many of them, I was a part of a kids' theater/singing group. I was Dorothy in "The Wiz," Nala in "The Lion King,"and sang many songs like "Aquarius" and "The Time Warp" (which I will never ever tire of). And then there was the community theater group I was involved with, whether it was having a small part in the ensemble or working as a techie. I loved every minute of these experiences--I'm a proud drama kid--though some productions weren't as fun as others and I hated striking the set. But there were so many little "defining moments" from not only being on stage or waiting just offstage to switch out a set, or even waiting for the next cue in the warm high school hallways with the other members of the cast. It became a part of me. It was only during my final involvement with the theater group--that summer's musical was "Will Roger's Follies"--where it just wasn't fun anymore, and I wanted out. That was the summer I almost quit, the last summer I spent in my hometown. I needed to get away from the patterns I was seeing, because a lot of it made me sick. That's not to say that I wouldn't be up to doing theater again in the future--it's just that by that summer, I began to see through the illusion and understand the dynamics of the people I'd grown up with, and I could not handle it anymore.
In junior high and high school, I joined a summer reading group for teens that was held every Thursday. It was called Lunch Bunch, and we would sit picnic style in the conference room at the public library (go libraries!) and eat our lunches, do an activity, and then talk about what we were reading that week. By the time I joined this group (probably right after I finished 6th grade or 7th grade, I can't remember the exact year), I was looking for more to read, and I remember meandering to the YA section for the first time, somewhere I hadn't been before. There was a different feeling standing in front of those few shelves, inspecting the books to find a good one. It seemed...dangerous, and from there, I have never looked back. I'm almost positive that the first summer I was a part of Lunch Bunch, I read a book called That Summer by Sarah Dessen, and it seemed like my life changed, even if it really didn't. I loved being a part of it, and I really miss it.
The summer between my freshman and sophomore years, I spent a lot of time by myself. I read nineteen books--an accomplishment I was very proud of--and began driving lessons. It was a big summer; I was fifteen, and I was determined to be more grown up. I started carrying a purse with me everywhere because I had a learner's permit. My driving instructor rejoiced when I finally drove over 60 miles an hour on the highway. I remember really, really wanting to be a good driver. That was my mantra as I started building up my driving hours: "You need to be a good driver, you need to be a good driver..." Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix came out that summer, and I lost myself in its 800+ pages. It's still my second favorite HP book (the top spot is held by DH). That was also the last summer we went to Michigan and saw my grandmother; she died the following October. I did not know the following school year would be so bad, and it was. Royally. I was incredibly relieved when summer came again.
I know I'm probably not making a lot of sense in this post. As usual, I've been thinking too much and the start of summer vacation has prompted a whole lot of memories that I had almost forgotten I had. There is a certain something about it, though, that keeps me interested. I love reading YA books about summers--and Sarah Dessen is the queen when it comes to good summer reads, whether they're set in summer or not. There's something about the freedom, the liberation in a road trip or vacation, the sounds of thunderstorms, the peace from watching the stars, listening to the crickets and the cicadas, swimming and getting out and just being....I'll probably return to this at some point.
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