Yet Another Rainy Day

Summer holidays are supposed to be the time of year that everyone looks forward to, the point for which you spend the rest of your year working, a time to relax in the middle of a busy year.  But here I am going to make a confession that does not align with that which we are supposed to think: I don’t like the summer holidays.

Of course I love the nice weather that the summer brings (when it decides to show up) and the chance to take a break from the usual busyness of work.  But to me, the start of the holidays is the beginning of the end.

August to me means not a lot is going on, usual activities are not taking place, people are less available to hang out because they are away.  It means the summer is nearly over and before you know it, it will be September and the start of the slide into another dark and cold winter.  And those winters seem to go on forever.  The days are already noticeably shorter and the evenings are darker earlier.  The long days of June are nearly two months past already.

August also means that even work is quieter, leaving me too much time and space to think.  By which I mean, worry.  My brain can always find something to worry about, big or small.  But the less there is going on around me and in my life, the more it worries. Maybe that is why they call it the silly season, because your brain just goes completely daft. At least mine does.

It is earlier in the year that is the best time in my view.  When the days are getting longer and there is the wonderful prospect of months of being able to be outdoors without being completely wrapped up in layers upon layers of clothes.  When the clocks go forward at the end of March and suddenly the world seems brighter.  When spring is in full bloom in April, and when the warmth of the sun really begins to be felt in May.  These are the days I would live in forever if I could.  If only they could last all year round.

As a single, childless woman, going on holiday in August seems pointless.  Why would I spend twice the amount of money to go away in the school holidays when I do not need to?  Maybe that is part of the reason I feel so fed up at this time of year.  Everyone else is going away but I am still in the office, trying to find myself enough work to do when everyone else is taking advantage of the quiet period to take it easy.

I try and get around this and extend my summer by taking a holiday somewhere warm in the autumn.  Trips to southern Europe are my go to for that final taste of warmth for the year.  A week in the sun in November is wonderful, even when you are as pale as I am.  But really it is just staving off the inevitable.  Winter is coming, as someone once said.

I know this sounds depressing and I should be out enjoying the summer now like a normal person.  To be fair I am writing this in the park on a hot, sunny weekend afternoon.  But at this time of year I can never shake off this sense of sadness at the summer’s end.

I know the seasons we have help us to mark time and rhythms in our lives.  I know they are both part of God’s wonderful creation and of scientific necessity.  But if it were possible to live forever in that space where summer is about to begin, I would.

August is the end of the summer.  Give me May any day.