And, Poof, It’s Gone.

Summer starts with lofty goals.  I’m going to do educational things with my kids.  I’m going to replace half the windows in my house.  I’m going to make our summer look like a sitcom, where everyone is always laughing and having a good time, and everyone learns a valuable life lesson approximately every thirty minutes.  I’m going to write a lot.  I’m going to be in such good shape that I’ll be able to become an Instagram model.  I’m going to take an army and sixty elephants across the Alps and invade Italy.  But what happens?  At the end of the summer you feel like three weeks have passed and you haven’t accomplished half of what you set out to do.  The past two years I have started the summer season with a simple five item attainable bucket list.  Well.  That became depressing. At best, I would accomplish three of the items on the list.  They were simple items too.  Things like, Keep The Car Clean All Summer.  Was I successful?  The french fry I found under the seat says no.  So, instead of making over the Alps with my elephants, I end up in exile on the proverbial island of Ephesus, wondering what went wrong.  This year I didn’t make a list.  I started, but left it unpublished.  That way I couldn’t look back and be disappointed.  But today, a week from Labor Day, with the weather already reminding me that the Devil’s Season is only months away, I found myself evaluating my summer and being depressed by lack of progress in certain areas.  Well,,,,, being depressed sucks.  So I have chosen to accentuate the positive. There were plenty of good things to celebrate about the best season.

• We took a beach trip to my favorite place on earth, St. John.  While there, I saw a shark, a spotted eagle ray, and took my family on a marathon swim across a bay which could have ended badly but didn’t.  High Five.
• I gave the fireplace room in our house a complete makeover.  This sounds mundane, but during the cold months I rarely leave this room so it is actually very important.  Thumbs Up.
• I put in overhead lighting in the office upstairs.  This is a plus because now my boys won’t be afraid to go into the room when it’s dark.  Double high five.
• My wife and I performed a tango routine at the anniversary party of the dance studio we go to.  I don’t like to brag,,,,, but we nailed it.  Fist pump.
• I finally installed the invisible fence for the dog in our backyard.  Then I subsequently set the perimeter setting so wide that he was afraid to go near his food dish inside the house.  Oops.  But hey, he could stand to lose a few.
• My oldest took a computer coding class.
• We kayaked at the lake a few times.
• We went to the family reunion.
• We did the solar eclipse thing with the kids.  Lets just say they weren’t impressed.

The more I think about the positives, the longer the list could get.  I still haven’t been to an outdoor movie with the family, or made it to Fort McHenry, or replaced a single window, and the kids played entirely too many video games.  But overall it was a successful summer. Looking forward, there is still enough warm weather left to accomplish a few more outdoor things.  As is always true, there is no time like the present.  I’m off to liberate some elephants from the Philadelphia Zoo.  I plan on marching over the Poconos and invading northern New Jersey.