A Summer's Eve

Families gathered on blankets share casseroles and baked goodies, the moms digging deep into the baskets brought from home. The tired legs of fathers stretch out before them as they lean back in the lawn chairs, settling in for a restful evening of entertainment. Soon the fiddle gets started. Little girls with brown chubby legs, curls framing their dimpled faces, skip and run to the music. Boys with crew cuts and sandaled feet soon cast them off so their bare toes can feel the grass as they hop and prance around.

An evening at the Norwood Green Summer Concert Series (is that what it is called?) Now I know that summer has officially begun. It felt like "those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer" -- finally. I don't know how many other "lazy, hazy, crazy days" there will be. Somehow, summer is often busy. But tonight I sat in my old-fashioned lawn chair while my little man improvised a dance along with twenty other children. (He loves to dance! I can just tell that he feels like me when a beat begins and an open space beckons -- ya just gotta get up and dance!) After 30 minutes of oldtime fiddle music, the puppet show began; a melodrama complete with a villain and damsel in distress. The kids loved it. That works for me.

I looked around at the assortment of people, many who were familiar and had already exchanged greetings with me: grandparents, granola-types (lots of them, many who homeschool their children), artsy folks, free-spirited children, teenage boys with their baseball caps, preppy (not too many), quiet boys and girls who sit and take it all in, moms and dads happy to relax and enjoy a warm gentle summer evening while their kiddies are entertained.

Ah...every once in a while you need to kick back and do nothing but revel in the relaxed company of other people who are doing nothing but reveling in the relaxed company of other people. Tonight was just that.