AN ODE TO SUMMERS LONG GONE

Orley Hood writes in the Clarion (Mississippi) Ledger today of the lazy days of summer long gone by. He captures the summers that I remember vividly. Summertime was a time of no cares, no worries, and no structure. Today, our children are barraged by all three. We have become a nation of people that has forgotten how to play, how to play together, and hence (I would argue) get along with each other.

In my childhood, we had the choice of two lots...one we designated for football, the other for baseball. Between the six or seven of us we would have baseball games that began at 9am that went for 4-6 hours. Time stood still in the summer. Until one by one we heard our mothers calling us home for supper. Then maybe we could get back out if we hurried through supper and get one or two more innings in before the sun set on our day. I wish my kids had that as well.

In a previous world, one that no longer exists in many of our communities, kids as young as 8 or 9 would wake up on summer mornings, gulp a bowl of cereal, grab bat, ball and glove, jump on their bike and pedal off into the day, not to return till suppertime.

Theirs was a civilization far removed from mothers and fathers, from adult restrictions, from glaring eyes separated far too long from their own childhoods.

In my town early on Saturday mornings the boys would meet on one corner and their dogs would meet on another corner. The day was young and the heart was full.

We'd play ball all morning, hit up somebody's mother for lunch, then swim at the city pool all afternoon, working our way home house by house, playing cards here or jumping on a trampoline there, kings of the world, masters of our universe.