Summer days and summer nights

 

I probably shouldn’t say this, because if I do I will jinx it. But so far this spring, the temperatures have been pleasant, not sweltering. That’s a nice change from recent Mays and Junes, where I started longing for fall before the summer solstice. This year I’m perfectly happy with warm days and cool nights and would be even more perfectly happy if the temperatures didn’t change at all until the autumnal equinox. Alas, that is not likely to happen, but every cool day is one less hot day before fall. I’ll take that.

Around my cabin, the ovenbirds are still calling, more so than the wood thrush, who are apparently settled down performing nesting duties. I hear a yellow-billed cuckoo nearly every day, too. The Canada geese goslings are getting bigger every day—they’ve reached the size of small ducks, now—and have become proficient swimmers, dutifully following mama and papa goose around the ponds.

The forest has that early summer feel. Everything is still moist from the spring rains, though they are beginning to diminish. Instead of rain every other day, now I go 4-5 days without rain and then it’s likely to be drizzle or a partial day’s rain. It’s a comfortable time of year, when jackets aren’t needed and sweat doesn’t ruin an outing. If only it would stay this way, though it probably won’t.

When I was a kid every now and again we have a cool summer. People who loved swimming would complain about it, but most enjoyed the break from hotter and more humid seasons. I can’t remember the last time I had a cool summer, though I do remember a rainy one several years ago. Those are also unusual here. Perhaps this will be the year for one here. I can only hope for that. A cool summer is long overdue, and in this time of climate change, perhaps it’s too much to hope for, but I will anyway.