What's the Big Deal About Summer? |

By Natasha Hayden
July 10, 2014

Here’s what my summer looks like. My preschooler’s first year of school ended on an early day in June. That same day, we left on a five-day camping trip. The week we were back, we celebrated three extended family birthdays and Father’s Day as well as the beginning of the soccer World Cup (When you grow up in Brazil, soccer gets in your blood.). The next weekend, we celebrated another family birthday, and the weekend after that, I had a Taekwondo event I couldn’t miss and several other events I did miss due to the impossibility of being two places at once. This past weekend, we celebrated the Fourth of July, on which we had an extended family garage sale, and a wedding. The summer is already halfway over.

Next week is the fair. The week after that, my husband will be at Momentum, a youth conference, so I will have the kids all to myself. Incidentally, Vacation Bible School is that week. The next week, we will be going on yet another camping trip, this time with my husband’s family. The week after that, I will be taking the kids by myself (because my husband can’t take three weeks in a row off work…obviously) out of state to visit my parents who are themselves going to be briefly visiting the United States from Brazil, where they live as missionaries. When we finally make it home for good, school starts again.

In all this craziness, we have tried to find time to go swimming, take care of our garden which will soon be exploding with more produce than I could reasonably prepare in a normal (read: non-summer) week, search out garage sales, pick strawberries, and do other outdoor activities we can’t do during the 10 months school is in session, noting also that the majority of those months (particularly this last winter), any outdoor activities that don’t involve snow are closed for the “season.”

Let’s rethink this whole summer thing. First, let’s stop conceiving babies in September. Why September? It’s not, like, Valentine’s Day or anything. Failing that, let’s just move birthday celebrations to February when we’re all sick of winter and the monotony is killing us. Or conceive babies in May. There are lots of option here.

Also, Father’s Day should just be moved, preferably to a date before Mother’s Day so that we can show the men how it’s supposed to be done. For that matter, if it’s not essential to summertime, it shouldn’t be there. Taekwondo events are out. And you know what the best time for weddings is? When it’s hot and that 50-pound white dress is going to be forever ruined by underarm sweat marks. I know, you want outdoor pictures, but if you aren’t getting married outside, just schedule a summer photo shoot. At least your dress will still be clean for it.

Let’s have winter garage sales at large indoor locations where lots of people can bring their junk together and you don’t have to hunt through the ads and then google addresses and then waste gas and time to travel to distant locations where you aren’t even guaranteed to find what you need. For that matter, if we have indoor communal garage sales, I’m sure we can manage communal greenhouses.

And vacations. Vacations don’t need to be in the summer. Winter is long and boring. There’s plenty of time, and there are plenty of places to vacation (and camp!) in the south in more temperate climates.

Vacation Bible School, an evening event, can just as well be during the school year as not. Mission trips and youth conferences can be over fall, winter, or spring breaks (so many breaks to choose from!), and why can’t the mission field be your own neighborhood anyway? Make it a winter weekend event!

I suppose we can’t move the Fourth of July. That’s kind of a thing. Also, it’d be kind of confusing and hard to remember if you tried to celebrate the Fourth of July on the Seventh of September, unless you are Brazil and that is your Independence Day. Then you’re all set. So, see, even something as seemingly immovable as the Fourth of July can be cleared away.

Fairs should move south. You can swim at the YMCA in the winter. And sunshine is overrated anyway. I’m a redhead. I burn. And you can get cancer.

So, let’s just do away with summer, shall we? Then we might have time to…oh, I don’t know, read a book or something.