It's The Little Things: Summer Nights

II

In the Summer, the nights are shorter. They simply are, whether you believe this to be psychcological or not. The hours of eve and night are albeit dark, but sparse and gone within the sleeping hours.

But there's a particular magic to Summer nights, a wild dance and exciting adventure to the stars of the dark. The kind of nights that you first spent in the summer after seventh grade, staying up late on your laptop and allowing yourself to feel either sad or free or depressed, late into the hours. The kinds of nights that you haven't had in so long so that when you do have them, there's a strong attack of nostalgia in the air; the sort that brings you to your knees and makes you clutch your chest and cry and laugh and shake your head and it all just kind of sucks in a wonderful way. The kind of Summer nights that are warm and simply aren't meant for sleeping, so you grab the step ladder from the even warmer garage and you drag it outside, where you prop it up on the bigger garbage can and use the smaller ones as large stepping stones. And then you grab the edge of the slanted roof, brown and rough with dirty tiles and you use that to steady yourself as you climb up the step ladder because the trash isn't full yet so you're unsteady on your feet. And as you hoist yourself up onto the edge of the roof, you crouch immediately because the dirt is getting to you and ew, what if there's bugs? But then you stand up carefully, and the soft wind tangles in your hair and the air is scented with must and water and something fresh, and then bugs aren't such a big deal anymore. Because then you're standing, and you feel invincible standing there because Alexander Hamilton had a stage but right then you have the whole universe. You move to sit against the balcony and stare up at the stars and you only know one or two constellations but hey, there's the North star and hey, I brought my headphones and my playlist is perfect for nighttime. So when the silence is serene enough that you don't need it anymore, you plug your headphones in and turn the volume all the way up and Rewrite the Stars comes on and you just think, wow, the world can be mine if it can be theirs, and let's play this on repeat. Then you dance, with your eyes closed, because now there's magic coursing through your veins. You dance until you sprawl lazily on the roof again and you spread out the blanket you brought with you that you slung over your shoulders when you got here and you lay your head on your sweater paws and warm arms and you think, mom and dad aren't coming home for the rest of the weekend and I'm comfortable here so I think I might just stay here. Then you get lucky, and there's lights in the sky, and you wish you brough a jar but the fireflies are close enough to be your nightlight anyways. Then suddenly you awake, and it's morning now, and you can see the sun rising and isn't it just lovely? But you come down, because the dog is worried about you because you weren't in your bed that morning and it was too early to wake the neighbors up.

That is the magic of Summer nights. That is the magic of Summer nights that no one seems to care about. Those; those are Summer nights.












Hey guys, this is part two of mine and Jackson's blog series. Stay tuned for his version!