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I used to dream of getting lost forever on an endless night road

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early june in the old neighbourhood.

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An afternoon in Cassis. 

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An afternoon spent by the river, with the bumblebees - that’s where I’ll be. 

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All summer at the beach. 

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Summer in the Gulf Islands - Loons wailing as the sun disappears, spending the solstice making friendship bracelets for myself, the slow easy pace of the parade of days. 

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On the car ride to the cottage in the Gulf Islands. 

The scorched land, fire ban in place, cupping a hand under the cigarette to catch any stray ember that may fall. A strange stretch, felt like an alien - crumbling houses with fake flowers pierced into the Astro turf, log cabins with moss covered roofs…eyes peering out like they knew I wasn’t from around there.  

Saw six Orcas breaching beside the boat on the way to the island, aliens of the underground. 

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Top - Seattle 2009 (?) - Summer dressed in neon, bubblegum stains on the sidewalks, Marlboro reds. 

Bottom - Antibes, 2011 - The whipping wind, song of foreign voices, the dry taste of wine. 

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The hills always know when I’m home.

All the years of cold nights, summer campfires, shooting stars and once a year for a week in July when the Wiccans gather and bang their drums, the trees talk, trade information. A million shades of green, every hue a code.

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What I remember from every last summer - 

Flip-flops on the dash, the peach fuzz on my arms dyed blonde from the sun, top 40 radio blasting from a passing Jeep, how the cooler never kept things cool, the air perfumed with BBQ, pink nail polished fingers sifting through white sand, the sensation of timelessness on a day with no cares.

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The calm is chaotic. 

Legs moving with a narcotic heaviness under the weight of the river, disrupting the minnow’s path. Petals floating, life rafts for dragonflies. No one is here but there are eyes everywhere. Even the rocks are aware of our presence. The breeze rattles the maple leaves, the humidity tricking us into thinking we’re somewhere in the tropics. I twist a buttercup off it’s stem and watch it ride on down the river. 

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Girls with caramel skin in fluorescent bikinis, deserted sandcastles slopping away with each wave that laps in, wading out as far as I can then staring at  the mountains across the sparkling bay. Boys in cowboy hats, the sky pale as faded denim, seagulls tearing into a bag of Doritos. Music from Beach Area 1 lolling through the humid air, the heat warping the melody.

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Songs coming in through in waves of static, a bridge of white on your blushed nose from when you kept sunglasses on and sat in the sun all day. The heaviness of smoke, swirling up from the cigarette, the abstract touch of hand scratching sand from your scalp. 

Summer in the country always feels like a long slow 70s song.