The NY Times ran an short article this week titled 'Spaces of Summer'. We all have them. They could be at home, in the neighborhood, or at our favorite beach spot. Like most spaces that evoke emotions and memories, it's the people that we spend time with there and experiences we have there that are what really make them "summer spaces". Architecture and construction materials add to the experiences and enhance the moments, but we don't expect the same build quality or design of our summer places as we do those places that need to be habitable 12 months a year. We probably don't want them to be so like the places that we left to come to our summer spots of choice. Summer places should be unique to "the season".
Unlike the sturdier structures where we endure the rest of the year, summer places are meant to be temporary, as fleeting in their pleasures as the season they serve. Rickety and often unheated, they sit patiently through the cold, dark months, drained of water and life, embodying a central truth about summer: that it is a place you can only visit, not inhabit.
But summer is so seductive that we have long been trying to establish lasting settlements there. The nation’s population has been migrating south and west for decades, chasing the illusion that constant sun is enough to keep summer alive beyond September. The northern latitudes have taught us a different lesson: that summer is more than just weather, and that it must be earned, through Januarys that will never be mistaken for Julys, no matter how mild some, like this last one, might be. Even here, though, the urge to make the season permanent has altered its landscape.
Those who live in the Northeast are very familiar with the dramatic difference in those summer spaces from season to season. Anyone who's visited those spots in the middle of the piercing chill of February knows that some of these places may be unrecognizable. They may be shuttered, dormant facsimiles of the full-of-life-and-character spaces they are during summer.
That's one thing that makes summer places so appealing - they leave us wanting more. We know we can't pick up and go anytime we want like our favorite pub. The experiences can only happen during a fleeting three months every year. Then we have nine months to think back on them, and dream about making more when we get our chance.
Kevin Coyne, the writer of the article, also points out another reason those summer spaces mean so much - because "summer is more than just weather, and...it must be earned". After you've suffered through 6 months of cold, grey weather, and battled colds, flu, slush, heating bills, and little sunshine, you feel you've done your time. When the weather turns right, you deserve everything that summer has to offer.
Anyone who knows the meaning of the name of this blog will understand that I have a disagreement with Coyne when he writes that summer "is a place you can only visit, not inhabit". There is no doubt that the season itself is fleeting, but it does not need to be completely left behind when we board up our summer houses and head home. Even for those of us who live in year-round warm climates, is "constant sun...enough to keep summer alive beyond September"? I think so. In fact, I don't think you need constant sun and warmth. It helps, but it's not necessary.
Summer will always be alive in this blog. Let's celebrate that it's also now alive and well in our favorite summer spaces for all of us.
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