I'm being haunted. The fall circulars are beckoning, the back-to-school catalogues are stacking up, and I'm not even close to being ready to hang up my flip-flops.
I'm sick of being told to live in the moment when outside forces are constantly pulling me into the future. It's only August and I'm convinced that I should order those all-weather parkas before the good colors sell out. It is hard to enjoy the remaining weeks of summer when you are stuffing wool sweaters into the Old Navy 20-percent-off bag or fighting for the last Hannah Montana three-ring binder.
Quite frankly, August is kind of bumming me out this year.
It's not that I dislike fall; in fact, it's my favorite season. It's just that August is summer, and summer is when you are supposed to be doing summerlike things. These "things" that I refer to do not include the following:
Wandering through the office supply store looking for those red composition notebooks while the kids write on each other's faces with Sharpies.
Pouring over the gymnastics, dance, soccer, band and underwater basket weaving schedules to see when you need to sign up, how many forms you need to fill out and just how much equity you will need to pull out of your home to pay for it all.
Looking for a backpack that is "not too big, not too small, not too babyish, not too heavy and in a really cool color." I am also told that it should be an over-the-shoulder bag — one strap only — which doesn't qualify as a backpack, but then again, I'm the mother and evidently I don't know anything.
Finding an insulated lunch bag that will hold several Tupperware containers, a large bag of Pirate Booty, a moldy granola bar and a water bottle and that will still fit neatly inside that really sleek over-the-shoulder bag. Bonus points for a zippered pocket that will house plastic braided bracelets, half-chewed erasers and cootie catchers.
Searching for a pair of plaid sneakers with mismatched laces that are effortless to put on. (In fact, they need to put themselves on.)
Going to Claire's to get my oldest daughter's ear pierced so I can spend more money on jewelry she can lose and more time with a bottle of rubbing alcohol and a bag of cotton balls.
Realizing that your kids haven't finished — or started — their summer reading lists and becoming the poster parent for literacy each evening, shutting off "iCarly" on TV so the kids can delve into the arduous life of a 19th-century pioneer.
I am trying desperately to resist.
My point is that we deserve August. We've earned it. We need to savor its virtues — lighter traffic, easier schedules and longer days that include cookouts, parades and Sam's Summer Ale.
I don't want August to be the new September. I don't want to think about "back-to-school" until the last sparkler has fizzled on Labor Day, until the last piece of watermelon has been eaten or, at the very least, until TV weatherman Al Roker starts wearing his fedora hats.
So it is the third week in August and I have yet to purchase a notebook or a No. 2 pencil. I still haven't signed the kids up for fall activities, and they aren't nearly finished with their summer reading. There are no new haircuts or shoes. We are quite content to be in our shorts and T-shirts with no particular place to go.
I am fighting the temptation to kick into fall mode even as I see the Halloween decorations mocking me in the stores. But I will not give in. I will not turn my back on summer, not unless there is a really good sale on those parkas.
¢¢¢
Sue Tabb writes from her home in Newburyport.
