Goodbye, Summer

School starts next week, and we snuck in a last weekend trip to the lake. It had rained most of the night before, and the morning was overcast when we set out. But the sun came out just after we got to the park. The weather must have scared away most folks, so we had the whole place to ourselves.

I haven't used my camera much this summer, and I enjoyed the process of getting my "camera" eyes readjusted. At first I saw the stones on the beach as an amorphous gray pile. Then my eyes snagged on the man-made debris: a spent gun shell, a bandaid, a bottle cap. The colors and patterns of the natural world finally emerged. Ladybugs flitted between stones (which I didn't manage to get a good photo of). Shells and seaweed formed abstract tableaux.


Shells nestled among the stones and a piece of weathered red brick.


A strand of seaweed framed a stone glossy from a receding wave.



A delicate branch rested on a stone frame.


Seaweed arched across a stone.


Not far away, a caterpillar formed a fuzzy arch across the wood chips on the playground.


It was a quiet goodbye to summer.

Settling In

I have done a lot of driving this summer. Lovely drives down country lanes bordered by vegetation so lush that my car moves through tunnels of green.

Down the country lane that leads to the county fairgrounds, I admire the barn that has been rooted on its Maryland hill for at least a century. Nature and the elements have gently altered it. Trees have grown to tower over it. Its boards have weathered to silver in places. The farmer has tweaked it: a cinder block office has been tacked onto the side; a new tractor parked alongside; a tin awning added to shade stalls. Surface changes only: the barn's frame--its essence--remains intact and functional. More than that, though, the evidence of the slow accumulation of refinements means that the barn belongs.

I have to admit that as I pass the barn I feel envy mixed in with the admiration. Not envy in the sense of wanting to possess what the farmer has. But envy for the barn's quiet, sure knowledge of belonging.

It has been a little over a month since we moved to Maryland, and I am still feeling an acute sense of dislocation, a sense of not being home. This is my 12th move in my 43 years, the 8th move as an adult. I know the drill--how to pack and unpack and dispose of boxes, update addresses, register kids in school, make friends, scout out grocery stores and restaurants and doctors and hair stylists. Those are the surface changes that are meant to take hold and root me in a new place. But the roots are slow in taking hold since I know that this is only a temporary move, a one-year caesura in our life back in New York.

So I'm betwixt and between, and feeling uneasy about it. But I'm also trying to hold on to the idea that this in-between-ness could hold some rewards as well: a heightened appreciation for all of the amazing things in my old home and in my new one. And, most importantly, that what I have right here with me--my family most of all--is all that I need to feel at home.