My Best Summer Memories

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We’re having one hell of a heatwave here in Upstate New York. With less people going out and more people staying at home, the days definitely feel longer. This got me thinking about how long summers seemed when we were kids, and how sweet those days felt. Remember when summer vacation had just started and it seemed like an eternity before you’d have to be back in the classroom?

Since we’re knee deep in the dog days of August and life feels like a Country Time Lemonade ad, I thought I’d compile a list of my very favorite childhood summertime memories. I ended up with close to 50, and I’m sure I’ll think of more later. If you’ve got a few to add, I’d love to hear about them in the comments below.

1. Sitting with my grandma on the back porch with root beer floats made with Hires root beer and wondering if we’d see fireflies
2. Picking things out of our garden. We grew tomatoes, zucchini, radishes, cucumbers and beans. LOTS of beans. Yellow and green!
3. Swimming with the neighborhood kids in their pool.
4. My grandma watching As the World Turns and Another World
5. Traveling to York Beach Maine and watching them make taffy in the window of The Goldenrod
6. Helping Grandma hang laundry outside to dry and the way the wind billowed through it
7. Playing frisbee with my dad in the field next door to our house
8. Bike riding with my best friends from school and stopping to spend all our money on candy
9. Spreading Noxema all over my frequent sunburns and spending the night in front of a fan
10. Traveling to Bar Harbor, Maine and Acadia National Park and swimming in water so cold it turned my legs blue
11. Listening to cicadas on long summer days
12. My dad taking us out for ice cream on a Sunday
13. The cool shade produced by the maple trees in our backyard
14. Going to a small amusement park called Sherman’s in Caroga Lake with my dad and filling up on popcorn, cotton candy and riding the ferris wheel
15. Trying to quickly eat popsicles in the heat before they’d fell apart onto the driveway
16. Coming back later to see all the ants eating the popsicle pieces that didn’t make it into my mouth
17. Having my next door neighbor take me swimming at her relatives’ pool
18. Drinking Grandma’s homemade, unsweetened ice tea on hot afternoons
19. Pretending the ocean was in my backyard and I could go swimming whenever I wanted
20. Picking wild strawberries, blueberries and raspberries with my neighbor and then watching her make muffins that turned out purple
21. Buying new school supplies at the end of August
22. Going to the Fonda Fair with my dad, playing carnival games, getting fresh-squeezed lemonade, fried dough and watching my dad go nuts over sausage & peppers
23. Savoring the last couple days of vacation while the Jerry Lewis telethon droned on in the background
24. Traveling to Agawam, Massachusetts to go to Riverside Park where I was too chicken to go on the (famous at that time) Loop Coaster
25. Playing badminton in the backyard with my dad
26. Eating fried clams at Spiller’s Restaurant in York Beach, Maine
27. Driving up Cadillac Mountain in Bar Harbor. See picture above. Apparently, I was a better traveler than wardrobe planner
28. Watching a meteor shower in the middle of one summer night with my grandfather
29. Riding my “Big Wheel” in the driveway and the way the plastic wheels grated over the sand.
30. Watching the lunar eclipse one year with my neighbor and calling it an “eclipse party”
31. Staying overnight at my sister’s house (we didn’t grow up together), playing in the pool and cooking up Kraft Mac & Cheese between the two of us
32. Shopping at the malls during the 80’s and going to Record Town, Waldenbooks, Thom McCan, Barbara Moss and so many more!
33. Playing basketball on the new hoop my grandfather set up for me in the driveway
34. Hanging a dartboard on that basketball post and challenging my dad to a game (and having a dart fall out of the board into my pinky toe where it stood straight up….ooooooowwww)
35. Picking green beans at the end of the season and helping my grandmother freeze them for the winter
36. Trying to get squirrels and chickadees to eat out of my hand
37. Having large dishes of Breyer’s chocolate ice cream and stirring it until it became soft ice cream before shoveling it into my mouth
38. Picking wildflowers, popping the heads off dandelions, scattering milkweed fluff and–finding those cools plants with bubble-like blossoms you could pop on the back of your hand
39. Climbing trees and being so terrified of climbing back down
40. Playing in the sand in my driveway and creating roads, houses and neighborhoods
41. Sitting with grandma in our lawn chairs and doing nothing just because it was “time to rest”
42. Playing on my swing set that had a slide and gymnastic rings (but no see-saw. I was jealous of the ones that had see-saws).
43. Doing cartwheels and somersaults on the soft grass
44. Having my grandfather teach me how to walk on my hands. Hmm, wonder if I can still do that?
45. Being thrilled when we got electrical storms and the power went out. Yeah..I still do.
46. Rolling down our hills with my sister ’til we got so dizzy we couldn’t walk straight. This I still don’t do.
47. Pretending I was was going “camping” in the backyard and using a Pringles container as a canteen
48. Doing some summertime reading–Judy Blume, anybody?

You know, as I look through this list, most of these activities were free and at home. Like, something you could do during a pandemic. As businesses slowly open up (most things except gyms are now open in New York) we watch and wait. Some of us are apprehensive about going out. And though we can’t control what happens out there, we can sure control what we decide to do with our time at home.

If you look hard enough, you can find a wonderland of things to do. And later in life when you look back, hopefully they’re things you cherished.