Summertime and the Living is Breezy
It’s been an unusually nice summer weather pattern here in Ithaca the past fortnight. Some days get up into the 80’s and feel a bit hot in the afternoon, but most days have been in the mid 70s and start and end cool. Yesterday, my big event for the day was to be a barbecue in the early evening with several friends from my University involvement days. The granddaughters were off with their father riding the black diamond bicycle trail from the base of Cayuga Lake up to the Toughannock State Park about eight miles up the Western side of the Lake. That would keep them busy for much of the day. Daughter Carolyn was either out for a run (she is a marathoner and runs six to eight miles every day in training) or headed with Kim to Wegman’s (the go-to place for the entire town of Ithaca on most Saturdays) to shop for the gathering later in the day. That left me home alone and free to do as I please. As much as I love Homeward Bound and have taken great care of it for twenty-six years, since I am within four months of ceding control and use of it to the University, I am not inclined to do much maintenance or yard work in my spare time. I did pull a few offending weeds in the driveway and on the gravel paths just so it didn’t look too unkempt, but otherwise I decided to just sit and write or watch an iPad movie.
My retirement is highly focused on the regular decision point of where to sit. That has mostly to do with the weather and the time of day. Back on my hilltop, I know exactly where to sit under differing circumstances of weather and time of day and I therefore know exactly where to go for exactly what sort of comfort I am seeking. These days, what I plan to do with my sitting time is less problematic to that decision since everything I do is on my iPad. I write, read, work (as in prepping expert witness materials or updating a syllabus for one of my courses for the Fall), and generally entertain myself for whatever time my charge lasts. That then gives me a convenient break while the iPad recharges, to loosen up by walking around, doing some simple chore like watering the flowers or finding some other pastime to amuse myself until it is time to return to the iPad and start all over again. While I know all the places to sit and how to gauge them on the hilltop at Casa Moonstruck, I am far less familiar with the same issue here at Homeward Bound. Where the sun rises and sets is always an important starting point. It is the giver of light and warmth for better or for worse, just as it was for primordial man 10,000 years ago. Of course, primordial man was not focused on a backlit white screen nor did he have polarized Persol sunglasses or even a nice cap with Gramps emblazoned on the front to help manage those elements. I have all that and more like mechanized awnings and table umbrellas, not to mention a wrap-around porch to help me with all this natural ambiance.
My choices here on this property start with sitting out on the deck either in the sun or shade, down on the pool slate terrace (which gets wicked hot in the direct sunlight such that barefooting it is not an option) either in the sun at a metal table or under the far awning in a lounge chair. I can sit in the backyard on one of the Adirondack chairs and commune with my Socrates stone and copper statue. And then there is the porch, that place where retired people like me are supposed to go to rock away their lives, watching the world go by. If I am into watching, the place to sit is in one of the rockers that face the road and the 17th green of the Robert Trent Jones Cornell Golf Course. I rarely do that because the golf bores me more than not these days and the road can get pretty busy and noisy as cars wiz by. Its one thing to watch the world go by and quite another to feel and brace yourself against the passing traffic.
That leaves the side porch that faces the parking area of the house. I have several sliders there that give one a gentle rocking motion and afford one a view of the goings and comings of the house as properly befits a spectator rather than participant to life. When I sit there I feel as though I am guarding the house. It hadn’t occurred to me this way, but my daughter thought that my sitting out there the other night under the porch light with flying insects swirling around me as I waited for the late night arrival of my latest guests who had been delayed on the road, made me look very creepy. I think that is less so during the day due to the lighting and absence of the bugs. I had another good and similar reason for choosing that spot to sit and ponder my world and that was that my late-arriving friends were scheduled to leave and I didn’t want to miss them to say goodbye. They were staying in the carriage house and seemed unduly concerned about not interrupting my peaceful enjoyment of Homeward Bound, so they might truly have tried to slip off and leave the goodbyes to a text or email. I wanted them to feel more welcome than that since I very much liked them and felt an obligation to make their stay enjoyable.
In preparing for their stay I had been making up their beds before they arrived and decided that we really did need better bedding even with only a short time until handover (that is starting to feel like pre-1997 Hong Kong), so I went with Carolyn to Target and redid all the sheets and pillows. These friends are preparing for their own handover with their youngest, a son, matriculating at Cornell this Fall. I had written a recommendation letter for him and was thrilled that he had gained admission since I viewed it as a righteous uplifting of a very worthy family to one of the best schools in the nation. So, there I was, siting, actually standing guard on the side porch, alternating writing a few stories that were in my head (there are always stories in my head) and finalizing my ethics course syllabus. Doing what I do.
And that’s when it struck me. I was siting on a porch on a sunny, pleasant Ithaca day, with nothing pressing on my mind and just relaxing when I noticed a mild and cooling breeze pass through. It was the kindest of breezes, the sort that doesn’t ruffle your feathers, but more titillates your skin. It was cool, but not cold and probably served to take the tactile ambient temperature from 75 down to 72 in the friendliest of ways. This is what life is about I thought to myself for no particular reason. All was well with my family, who were all off doing the things they like to do with their leisure time. I had something to look forward to, my evening gathering with longstanding friends, who I have known for between 25 and 50 years and to whom I owe a great deal in my life (both are ex-professors of mine and ex-Deans of mine and therefore role models). I had no pressing work that needed immediate attention, but was rather there for me to do at my leisure. My health was good other than a sore left shoulder that only bothered me at night while sleeping on my side. And, I was waiting to hail my visitors when they emerged from their home away from home in the carriage house, as they are people who I have happily helped evolve to a higher plane of life for them and their family.
George Gershwin, one of the great American composers, wrote Summertime in 1934 at the depth of the Great Depression. That was twenty years before I was born and it was during my mother’s early college days here at Cornell. If you mention the season of summer to me, my mind goes to lightning bugs in the backyard here in Ithaca, so to me, summertime is Ithaca. The world is in as much or more disarray today as it was in 1934. It didn’t stop Gershwin from finding that the living was easy and it hasn’t stopped me from finding that it’s summertime and the living is breezy.