The end of summer...

…is coming.

It’s not here yet but it’s en route. Summer is collecting its things—a tote bag filled with half-eaten berries; a well-reviewed book with a dollar acting as a bookmark; high SPF sunscreen; grass-stained shorts; Birkenstocks that are gritty with use; a mask, of course—and preparing to say a noisy farewell to us, the not-as-tanned-as-we-might-like assembled guests.

I don’t hate summer, but I certainly don’t love it. I think it’s because my most formative childhood years were spent in Nigeria, so close to the equator, and therefore a place of regular, perfect 7pm sunsets, all year round. (It’s why I miss Nigerian Ramadans so much!) Summer away from that latitude and longitude is capricious in the way of handsome people who know they can get away with it; too many people love summer for it to ever truly lose favour! I’m lucky. Now I live in New York, where the seasons are distinct(ish) and there are long weeks and months when you can make plans because the seasons still make an effort to match the picture books you read as a child. But summer as a British person? In Britian? There, summer is a time to reflect on the sins of the Empire, because how else to explain the punishment of the months between June and September, when the “green and pleasant land” is often lashed by rain, and the air sometimes turns frigid, and the aspect is altogether grey and gloomy? Summers in Britain are character-building. They are the unsmiling governess in those books you read in Key Stage 2 English class, here to make sure you cultivate some moral fibre. They are the non-human fact that a lazy TV critic might call “the fifth character” as a way to make their word count. British summers are a whisper on the wind, tickling the back of your neck, gone before you can catch anything substantial in your hand. They’re almost romantic. But they fall short.

But soon autumn! The only season I know how to dress for. Not that we’re going anywhere any time soon; the pandemic will roil on for a while longer, alas, and those of us lucky enough to have a vaccine in our bodies will hope it does its job, and those without will either be fine, or get mildly or very ill, or they’ll die, because that’s the literal job of a disease and when it’s not curtailed, it thrives, as we all have the right to do. And then winter will follow, and our misery will compound, because adding snow and ice to most equations does not equal mood-lifting delight even in the best of times. And we are, in many ways, enduring the worst of times.

Before all that horror creeps in (think on February, chums, and shudder), there will be autumn. Some of it will be dreary, of course. There will likely be soup, and lots of lentils, and naturally. Vitamin D tablets. There will be more poetry, because that is the season for it! The box fans will be packed away, and like Saturn and her famed return, socks will turn up once more to take centre stage. Some of autumn will look and feel like that great orange-hued scene in When Harry Met Sally… you know the one… Sally is wearing a jumper under her herringbone, plus a hat… and Harry is wearing a jumper under brown leather, and they’re walking and talking about their recurring dreams? I’m looking forward to that bit! Autumn is the real new year, isn’t it. All that change in the air. You could change too. Right? Right.

PS: You may have noticed this letter is now coming to you from Substack. Nothing’s changed: it will be as sporadic as before, and still with no clear aim re: content. You’re welcome.