In
my visual childhood sense of the year Summer was at the bottom arc of the year. My older
brothers were good at making up rules that shaped my universe. According to them we could
go barefoot after mother's day and they could take off their wet suits on surf
trips after my birthday. I trust Zoë's visual image of the summer has a
different turn. Tonight Zoe and I walked to the top of the drive way at 915 pm.
There was still some color in the sky on this summer solstice, the longest day
of the year. She vaguely remembered the summer she was in third grade when we celebrated
the summer solstice by going out in the row boat on our pond where we lit floating
candles and drifted day lilies in the water. that evening Zoë read us poems she had
collected over the year. That was also the year she and her friend Shannon renamed
the boat, the butter cup, and we spent long afternoons floating, reading and
writing poems.

"Go up into the gaps. If you can find them; they shift and vanish too. Stalk the gaps. Squeak into a gap in the soil, turn, and unlock a universe. This is how you spend the afternoon, and tomorrow morning, and tomorrow afternoon."
Annie Dillard Pilgrem at Tinker Creek
"Go up into the gaps. If you can find them; they shift and vanish too. Stalk the gaps. Squeak into a gap in the soil, turn, and unlock a universe. This is how you spend the afternoon, and tomorrow morning, and tomorrow afternoon."
Annie Dillard Pilgrem at Tinker Creek