Remembering Summer

Do you remember catching lightening bugs and putting them into empty mayonnaise jars with holes popped in the lids?

I love summer, the sights, the sounds, the smells and the feel. With the drizzly, damp, chilly, dark day today, I am lamenting that summer is almost gone. But instead of feeling down, I started to think back to the days when we didn't have air conditioning in our house or cars, when the kids played outside instead of sitting in front of a TV or computer and when summers were old fashioned fun.

Kids riding bikes with streamers hanging off the handle bars and a playing card clothes pinned to the spoke on the back wheel making the bike sound like it was racing down the street.

Grampa sitting in a lawnchair, listening to Ernie Harwell calling the Tigers' game on the radio, while the other men in the family were drinking a cold brew, congregated around the horseshoe pits.

Hanging upside down by our knees on the crossbars of the big swing set.

Standing in the long line at the Dairy Queen waiting to get our chocolate baby ice cream cone.

Climbing the big maple tree in the yard.

Riding in the car with all the windows down and the wind blowing in our faces, smelling the diesel smell of the trucks as we passed by.

Laying in bed on a Saturday night, with the windows open, listening to the race cars racing around the track at the Mt. Clemens Race Track five miles away.

Playing tag, red rover red rover, statue and red light green light in the front yard with all the other kids in the neighborhood.

Laying down in the middle of the grass looking up at the clouds, trying to figure out what shapes they made.

Penny candy like squirrels and candy cigarettes or Mary Jane's and black licorice whips.

The smell of freshly cut grass when it was too long and playing in the big piles of grass that didn't get raked up.

Running through the sprinkler.

Shucking corn on the back porch.

Listening to the crickets chirp outside the open window.

Summer memories, they are the best.