The summer that didn’t exist
This month’s essay has no content that is inadvisable to listen to in front of little ears, if that is a consideration for you.
If your kids, like mine, go back to school when it’s still hotter than the devil’s undercarriage, then happy first day of school! As my youngest said when she popped her head up after a wave knocked her over in the ocean this summer: “I made it! I didn’t die!”
I have, as in past years, been in a huge funk the last few weeks, which always happens in the second half of July and lingers until school starts. I have these visions of what summer will look like—lazy mornings and adventures and pool days and movie nights. I get so excited for summer every year, because every year I live in the delusion that it will be idyllic.
But nothing is idyllic. Though snippets are, my kids hate putting on sunscreen (as do I, if I’m being honest) so we never go to the pool as much as I think we will, and it's too hot and sticky to get motivated to do the adventures, and my girls can almost never agree on a movie without bickering first. In addition to all of the lovely things I envisioned, whether or not they actually turned out to be lovely, we also had a lot of: fighting, dysregulation from being out of routine, name calling, noise (SO MUCH NOISE—not just the children, but from a big house project, as well), crankiness, cabin fever, an uptick in controlling behaviors, etc.
The reality of being in a family is that we (my spouse and I) are human and our kids are human and, unfortunately, humans are fallible and imperfect and subject to moods. My eldest summed it up perfectly last week when she said—I’m paraphrasing, but this is the gist—“we [she and her sister] are sick of each other and we’re sick of you and we’re sick of summer and we’re sick of not being at school.”
I also struggle a lot in the summer with internal conflict. I have a foot in the working world through my fiction writing (this summer, querying) and my essays here and my book promotion, and I wonder whether any of it actually adds something meaningful to other people’s lives…am I spinning my wheels on something no one would miss if I stopped? My engagement metrics would suggest yes, and yet I can’t let myself give it up, because that would feel like I’m walking away from part of myself. But since I make zero dollars from those things, it feels disingenuous to call it work (though yes, I know, imposter syndrome/getting in my own way/hurting my own feelings, that’s a whole other essay, folks).
I also have a foot in the full-time parenting world as a parent without paid employment, but since I harbor ambitions and push myself to keep my career moving forward even in the summer and—oh goodness, can I even put this out there?—I don’t enjoy “only” being a parent—which is a whole other essay, as well—it’s hard for me to disconnect from my “working brain” and lean into the theoretical magic of summer. But when I do sit down to work, invariably I feel like I’m spending my time on the wrong thing.
So actually, maybe my struggle isn’t from trying to have one foot in both worlds, it’s from feeling like I need to have both feet in both worlds simultaneously. Which, unsurprisingly, turns out to be an excellent way to disappoint yourself.
And then we get to the last stretch of summer when things start to pick back up—meet and greets and last camps and last playdates and last everything before the school-year grind restarts, and I’m both hugely relieved and furious with myself for not taking advantage of the time when I had it. I regret not getting more done professionally. I regret not giving myself over to the moment with my kids. So basically I cannot win, and that is both a situation and a mindset of my own making because I keep judging myself against two versions of me that can’t coexist the way I have them designed in my mind.
I don’t have an answer on this one, friends. Just lots of questions about how to find balance between myself and my kids, between me as a person and me as a writer, and how to separate my identity and value from what I “produce” or “have to show for my time.” The only answer I have is to tell you that if this resonates, I see you. And it’s hard for me, too. And maybe there really is no answer. Maybe it’s less about finding the balance and more about letting go of the fantasy that this will be the year I somehow manage to both live comfortably in my ambition and let myself disconnect from it and have fun with my kids. Maybe we all need to accept that every season asks us to be where we are and let go of the versions of ourselves we believed we should be.
And maybe I need to let myself grieve the summer that didn’t exist and celebrate the moments we actually had.
This essay was written without the use of generative AI. I just really love em dashes. And metaphors.
Recommendations Roundup
Words of Wisdom
Esperance (es-per-uhns): the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best.
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