Winding Down Summer

Cape Cod Weather Today: It was another hot one today, in the 80s and sunny. The dark clouds on the horizon never got close enough to blot out the sunshine. It was finally cool enough to mow the lawn around 5 pm...

Summer is almost over. Well, actually the kids don't go back to school for more than two weeks, but I'm so done with their summer vacation. I'll be the guy in the Staples commercial singing Christmas Carols as I dance down the aisle buying pencils and notebooks...

What is it about routine? I like having a weekly schedule and a daily to-do list, but after a while I long for a change. Something different to break the monotony.

And then I just start getting cranky about it all.

I feel like I'm a creature of habit, and yet every few months I need a new habit. Is that normal? I really don't mind all the taxi driving I end up doing; in summer, I'm driving over to the yacht club ever day for someone's lessons, to Hyannis once a week for middle child's guitar practice, and this summer to the Community Center every other day for Basketball Camp. It's a schedule I can memorize and live with... and I did and I have.... and now I'm done.

I'm ready for Back-to-School and a new routine. New morning rituals, bus schedules, making lunches, and after-school lessons and soccer, to all be rescheduled in September to create a new Fall routine. Which will be in effect until the end of soccer season and the onset of Winter/Holiday.

Maybe it's not all my fault. Perhaps we've adapted ourselves to need the changeability of the seasons. The new sports seasons. The new sessions of lessons, etc. The new semesters at school. The new television seasons. Most importantly, the changing of Mother Nature's seasonal colors outside our windows.

Perhaps THAT's why this year's lack of early summer bothered me (and a lot of you, I'll bet) so deeply. We NEED the change of season. We look for it, and our psyche is adjusted for it. When it doesn't come, then what? We all get cranky.

"To every thing there is a season..." a concept that dates back to the Bible (I used to think it originated in a rock-n-roll song, but my 9th grade English teacher corrected me)

I'm ready for the season to change.