Summertime Blues (The Who’s Live at Leeds version)

Summer is to creativity as a newborn baby is to a decent night’s sleep.

I have never been able to muster up a ton of original thoughts from May to August. In Florida, I had a wonderfully convenient excuse. I was too damn hot. Hot = grumpy, so I was never in the mood.

Fine, that worked. Once I understood that my creative amusement park ride is a roller coaster and not a merry-go-round, I accepted it with little trepidation. That is how I evidently roll. I have big bursts of energy followed be long droughts of wondering what I should do with myself.

Than I came to Oregon and I had to readjust. The summers are warm and not so damn hot. I began to posit a calendar of uninterrupted creativity. From January to December; NFL postseason to NFL regular season. I could write (and podcast) and feel like I was inching toward the unreachable something of my life every day of the year. Nice.

But that is the term. Nice. This time it related to the weather. In Florida you could skip the entire summer and still be treated to “nice” weather. (the general collective definition of nice weather is sunny and warm.) However, up here, it takes the first four months of gray and wet to get to spring and summer,, and for some reason the entire region wants to get out there and enjoy it. Get out! Go! Get some sun, see the ocean, go to a park, talk a walk, go to the mountains, buy some strawberries.

Damn them. They’re correct. I should live first. Check.

So creatively, I slow down. I need input. I read a little more. I do more things after work. I just do more wandering and wondering.

So less writing. I can’t help it. I wish I was a machine like some of my favorite writers but there’s just no mileage when there is no gas in the tank. Crapola.

Of course, when autumn arrives, and the nose senses a distinct thinning of the once sultry, warm air; when the trees begin to pout and the neighborhood kids are busy inside, I am part of the invisible parade again. The days shorten and we huddle in our own circles of light; mashing keyboards or scratching in oversized sketch pads. We transform experience and inspiration and add a touch of cultural rip-offs to produce a tasty warm plate of whatever-the-hell once more.

But for today, sandals and sweet corn.