For a boy, summertime is the quiet of an early morning that dawns with gentle sunshine and the promise of woodsy adventures.
It’s sticky, berry-stained fingers, dusty sweaty faces, mosquito bites, and scraped knees.
It’s buried treasure maps, Indian hide-outs, and backpacks filled with rubber bands, important sticks, a harmonica, a cap gun, and a sweating bottle of water.
It’s basketball, baseball, football and wrestling–without grown up interference.
It’s a ravenous hunger satisfied only by a stack of peanut butter and jellies, apple boats, and chocolate chip cookies washed down with a cold glass of milk.
It’s the steady hum of insects, the scolding of squirrels, and the twittering of birds in your ears with the heat of noontime sun on your back and shoulders.
It’s wild bike races followed by a jaunts through the sprinkler and water gun fights.
It’s afternoons spent lying in the shady grass with a Hardy Boys book.
It’s a seemingly endless span of time that will be over before your mother knows it.