Aestas Estas

“Non semper erit aestas”

I want it to be summer more than I have wanted anything in a long time. Every single piece of me aches for it. For the sunshine, for the insufferable heat, for the smells, the flowers, for the swaying of trees, and for days unrestricted by time or commitment. I miss the sunsets – how my skin feels glazed with a million beads of invisible sweat that put themselves to sleep with the sun. I miss the scent of sweet grass, and the way my nostrils can predict a rainstorm. I miss sitting on the porch with an ice-cold beer and a clove cigarette, knowing there are no books that need to be read, no tests that need to be passed – only warm evenings spent in the company of the moon and stars. I long for iced coffee with cream, and the tomatoes my mom grows in her little garden. I miss gathering the courage to jump off bridges into cold Canadian rivers and I miss the sound of a canoe gliding over a still lake. I miss water that can’t be walked on but plunged into.

I could die happy, in the summer.

How can you be sad, standing bare-foot in the grass, with your hair lightly stuck to your temples from gentle perspiration, holding onto the hand of a loved one, sticky from too much lemonade? Winter has her beauty. She spreads her blanket of diamonds over the front lawns of people huddled up by the fire wearing wool socks and sweaters, and she breathes frost onto my windows to remind me that even death is beautiful. But she is cold, she is silent, she is too still. Give me summer and I promise I will not ask for more.