Friday, July 29, 2022 « 9
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It is hot out! The temperature gauge is creeping into the gotta-be-fake-news zone (fake news it is not) ; the cool mountain air isn’t so cool anymore and in the valley, air conditioners are running so hard they’re out of breath; and our gardens are becoming crispy, brown skeletons. By mid-day our perspiration sizzles like water drops in a frying pan of hot oil. Our glaciers are melting; our mountains are crumbling. We are burning up. On the radio the other day, I heard journalist and NPR broadcaster Scott Simon ask if the onerous heat of long summer days threatens the innocence of childhood. Will our grandchildren grow up being scared of summer? We grownups remember our summer of youth as a season of freedom, where we played outdoors all day, running barefoot, running through the sprinkler, running after the milk man in his truck, an empty bowl in our hands, hoping he’d toss us a chunk of ice to suck on, running away from the mosquito truck spraying fog into the atmosphere. We ran while playing kick the can, red Rover and ghost in the graveyard. We played until dark, when we were called inside to take a bath. Then, in our pajamas, we got a few minutes to sit facing the fan and hum a long, drawn out ah-ah-ah, our pulsating voices never ceasing to entertain. In 1855 John Greenleaf Whittier wrote a poem called The Barefoot Boy that captures the carefree summer days of yore. It begins like this: Blessings on thee, little man, Barefoot boy, with cheek of tan! With thy turned-up pantaloons, And thy merry whistled tunes; With thy red lip, redder still Kissed by strawberries on the hill; With the sunshine on thy face, Through thy torn brim’s jaunty grace; From my heart I give thee joy, — I was once a barefoot boy!
There's Little League, Hopscotch, the creek, And, after supper, Hide-and-seek. The live-long light Is like a dream, And freckles come Like flies to cream.
For generations, summer and its golden days provided an escape from tight shoes and school and instead gave children endless hours to run and play, explore and imagine. Today it’s different. Golden days have turned into blazing orange skies. There’s nowhere to run to escape the heat. Our planet is suffocating from the scorching temperatures: crops, forests, farm animals, wildlife, fish and butterflies. It seems as if the entire globe is either drowning or on fire. Mother Earth’s fever is rising at a menacing rate and it’s destroying us. We are destroying us. And so We wait for someone to stop this apocalypse. Surely, we think, our legislators will realize they need to make laws that will protect our precious planet before we perish in its inferno. Certainly, we tell ourselves, the people running factories will figure out they need to cut carbon emissions, stop dumping contaminants into the water, and clean up their messes. Of course, we convince each other, people everywhere are going to wake up one day before long and decide it’s time to stop buying plastic, cut back on driving automobiles, start riding bicycles or use public transportation, and repair, reuse, and recycle rather than throw away. When I heard Scott Simon on NPR asking if future generations are going to be scared of summer, I was driving 25 minutes to my destination, alone. I was one person in a car passing a whole bunch of other single-passenger vehicles. I could More recently, John Updike expresses almost see Simon’s finger pointing at me. the essence of childhood-in-summer with Why am I waiting for someone else to his poem June: heal our very sick planet? It starts with me. I am only one, but many me’s make The sun is rich, We and We can create change. Every efAnd gladly pays fort, no matter how small, is a gift to our In golden hours, grandchildren’s summers of carefree play. Silver days, And long green weeks That never end. School’s out. The time Is ours to spend.
You may let The Thunker know what you think at her e-mail address, donoholdt@gmail.com. © 2022 Sarah Donohoe
Ptarmigans, undergo seasonal changes of their plumage, from gray or brown, with barring in the spring and summer months and then to all white against the tundra snow. Ptarmigan and chick photo by Robert Burns
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