Summer Slides

Its a sunny morning and the cicadas are singing as if they are heralding the heat ahead. Memories of other summer days flow over me. • Sitting by the Andrews Air Force Base swimming pool while my kids practiced their laps for swim team • Eating bright red and juicy watermelon. In the days before fruits were shipped in Mama would not buy a watermelon before July 4 - saying they weren't ripe. • Wearing strappy sandals • Going barefoot at the beach - feeling the heat of the sidewalk, trying to avoid burrs, the feel of warm sand between your toes • Running in the hose on hot days - I especially liked it when we had the rotating sprinkler on • Home grown tomato sandwiches - thick juicy slabs of tomato slathered with Dukes mayonaise between slices of white bread.

• The sweet smell of honeysuckle on the vines covering fences. • Sitting on the front porch with my grandparents on the evenings before air-conditioning and listening to the grown-ups talk. • The sound of a metal floor-stand oscilating fan stirring up a breeze in the living room. • Tall glasses of iced tea with a layer of white sugar granules on the bottom of the glass. Memories are like snapshots or slides in a carrousel. Once you start looking at them its hard to stop. Each one is a doorway to more pictures or to a story.