Hello. Here we are in August, at the close of no-cook season. The season we eat some form of tomato or a peach salad for dinner every night followed by some type of flaky, baked thing packed with all the fruit that ripened too quickly. I barely come up for air when I eat meals like that. The sweet hydration of heirloom tomatoes, their peppery-earth scent. The luxury of course kosher salt on olive-oil-coated mozzarella. The warm zing of a baked plum. How can you EVER get enough of this gorgeous season that gives and gives of itself?
I can tell my daughter feels it, too. It’s not just that stone fruit and tomatoes top her list of favorite foods. Or that she can turn a whole peach into a sticky pulp in a matter of minutes. It’s that she understands: summer is for her, for us. It’s a time for us humans to live in our bodies, to re-introduce our bare skin to the air and water, to play hard and feel the salt and coolness of evaporating sweat, to rest deeply and preciously, held by the strength of the sun.
I can tell she feels it by the way she runs with abandon through the cold spray of the hose as I fill up her inflatable pool. Or the way she eats an ice cream cone. Pure delight, unbothered by sticky streams running down her hands and forearms as it melts. Last weekend, Adam bought her a giant scoop: light pink and studded with fresh strawberry pieces, perched precariously on a waffle cone. Almost bigger than her head, comically so. I rolled my eyes, thinking of the inevitable mess. But I could see the joy (or was it the sugar?) working its way through her vibrating little body. “Ice cream is fun!” she exclaimed, her eyes lit up with another one of those beautiful summer discoveries.
Her enthusiasm exposes just how much mine has dulled over the years…
Sometimes the purity of these small moments, of her excitement over something so ordinary, catches me off guard. I teared up a little, at the openness with which she experiences the world. And also because her enthusiasm exposes just how much mine has dulled over the years. Yes, ice cream is fun. But I often focus just on the aftermath, on what WILL happen: the stained clothing, the sticky hands. Not what IS happening: a cool, velvety bite on my tongue, a warm night, a happy child, a rose-colored memory in the making.
Same goes for summer itself. I live for this season, for its abundance, its sensuality. Yet, I can barely eat halfway through a nectarine without mourning the inevitable end of stone fruit season. My daughter knows how to be present for all the joy summer lays at her feet. For all her constant wiggling, she knows how to stay still long enough to fully experience what’s in front of her.
Stillness. When did I forget how to do that? The knowledge lives somewhere in the back of my brain, behind the mental load of the quotidien, the anxious ache of what’s next. That ache, the urgency like midday heat make July and August evaporate into this blur of a memory.
Your child can return some of that stillness back to you in the way they cheerfully demand attention, the way they fully devour what’s in front of them.
Though, a few moments stand out. I will never forget standing on that crowded sidewalk, feeling the wide-eyed hum of my daughter’s enthusiasm for her strawberry ice cream cone jolt me into the present. One benefit of motherhood, I’m realizing, is that your child can return some of that stillness back to you in the way they cheerfully demand attention, the way they fully devour what’s in front of them. They can teach you. As we move all too quickly toward the end of summer, I’m hoping it’s a lesson I can absorb.
