Summer Light

I've been thinking of places in latitudes above mine. Seattle, Minneapolis, Montreal, Oslo. I love the light that hangs on 'til late in the evening (in the summer, anyway.) People revel in those hours of light. Summer is such a celebratory time, given that in the winter, it can be so dark and cold. Nature gives us some sort of payback for the patience required and given to make it through those tedious months.

So, I'm thinking about summer, and wish of course that I had some more light with Peter - a little extra bonus time; that special evening time where the light lingers and one can play. I feel like the next thing after a grueling winter should be summer.

I remember as a child, the lingering summer light and other children's voices in the streets called us to play, but we were to be in bed "at a decent hour". It didn't seem fair. Mom used to read poetry to me and my brothers before bed, and often poetry by Robert Louis Stevenson. This is one about those nights:

Bed in Summer

In winter I get up at night

And dress by yellow candle-light.

In summer quite the other way,

I have to go to bed by day.

I have to go to bed and see

The birds still hopping on the tree,

Or hear the grown-up people's feet

Still going past me in the street.

And does it not seem hard to you,

When all the sky is clear and blue,

And I should like so much to play,

To have to go to bed by day?

I think my themes are I feel the change of seasons coming; I am mad that Peter's not here - I feel like I've gone through the hard winter and it's still winter in my heart, but summer is tugging - maybe a little more light, and I do want to play....