My Version of TGIF

TGIF, for me, currently would translate to “Thank Gods It’s Fall”.  And a truer sentiment has never been expressed.  This summer was…challenging, to put it mildly.

Summer and I have something of a love/hate relationship.  I am vampire pale and prone to illness when overheated.  Needless to say, that particular season and I are not besties.  I’ve come to understand that when June is creeping up, the best I can do is know my limitations, pay attention to them, and try to stay upbeat about what I can manage.  For fucks’ sake, I literally can’t take the heat, and yet every year I plan and implement a garden anyway.  If that doesn’t shine a ray of optimism from my pessimistic soul I don’t know what would.

I suppose if I am being completely honest, I can’t dump the blame entirely on summer, as the issues technically began in the spring.  It just snowballed (ha!) from there.  Late spring was all about a continuation of massive car trouble, money worries, plans getting pushed back, rushing to get the garden in, and what I can see now was also the beginning of a major depressive down-swing.

Then summer hit in full force and brought with it:  delays, crop failures, more canceled plans, many arguments, and weeks of constant noise courtesy of my neighbors’ reno/demo.  And then my old buddy full blown clinical depression dropped in for a visit.  And stayed.

I won’t go into detail, because it’s just not a healthy idea, I’ll just say that after weeks of despondency and truly not-good-thoughts things finally took an upswing, and as abruptly as it descends, the depression finally let up.

But summer wasn’t quite done yet.

I had about a week of “Hey, things are pretty okay…” before catastrophe struck.  I got up one morning with the idea of wanting to make preserves.  I left the house that day solely to head to the fruit stand, and proceeded to become involved in the worst accident I’d ever personally witnessed.  So, there I found myself mid-week in the dregs of August, standing by the side of the interstate in 96° heat, bruised, banged up, bleeding, covered in glass and putting the sunglasses—that I’d just found two car lengths behind my car—back on my head.  All the while staring at my utterly totaled car with the 14 lbs. of peaches in the trunk, and wondering what the fuck.

It was memorable to say the least, and somehow summed up the entire season.

Oh, in case you were wondering, I did get my preserves after all.  My nephew, brother, and mom went to the tow yard the next morning to empty the car and rescue the peaches from the wreckage.  I didn’t get to do more that supervise the jam creation, because…well let’s just say that seat belts and airbags are truly awesome for y’know, staying alive, but suuuuuuuuuck as far as soft tissue and musculature is concerned.  Although, the 60 mph impact might’ve had a lot to do with that, too.

Anyway, my summer was finally closed out by doctors’ visits, numerous insurance phone calls, “new” car hunting, and more physical pain than I’d ever before had to contend with.  Truthfully, thanks to a lot of mind-numbing “taking it easy”, time passing, and physical therapy I am just now starting to head towards feeling normal again.

Now, to be clear, I realize that summer likely isn’t actually to blame for all of this angst and stupidity.  Regardless, I am more thankful for autumn’s arrival than ever before.  I figure, at this point, summer and I will just agree to disagree, have a clean break, and try again (please gods with better results) next year.