Raggedy Ann Summers

This vignette in front of Glenda’s antique store, Somewhere In Time, recently sent me reeling back to my childhood. As I drove past it, headed out of town on errands, I was suddenly transported back as sun-drenched memories of childhood summers that I thought would never end flickered through my mind like worn but still-loved movie images complete with sights, sounds, and smells:

Long days and sleeping in. Sizzling sunshine and cool shade. Shorts, 2-piece swimming suits, and thongs for your feet. Lying upside down in the rocking chair reading Nancy Drew novels and horse stories for hours. Sucking the juice out of homemade Koolaid popcicles before crunching the ice. Running through the sprinker and popping tar "babies" (bubbles). Soft ice cream cones from the Shoestring Drive In eaten across the street at the park. Shivering through swimming lessons in the morning, a peeling nose and three-month sunburn from hours of swimming every afternoon, and going back for more in the stillness of the evenings. Playing stick horses and building card houses. Loading hay onto the back of a truck, picnic lunches at the barn, and swinging from a rope in the hayloft. Sleeping under the stars in the backyard and telling the same ghost stories over and over with a friend. Hamburgers with homemade barbecue sauce flipped over charcoal briquets, the crack of Hermiston watermelons sliced into triangles, and headaches from eating homemade ice cream too fast. Sparklers, parades, and fireworks on the Fourth of July, and a family barbecue on my birthday. Single-gear bicycle rides everywhere; standing to peddle uphill, sitting back and letting one or both hands drop from the handlebars during the downhill coast. The fire siren signaling noon or screaming a warning of dreaded grass fires. Saturday night movies for fifty cents, the warmth of my horse’s back beneath my Wranglers. The calming rhythm of hooves clopping on pavement, the smell of evening at sunset, and the pounding cantor of freedom on a dirt road. Freeze Tag and Annie, Annie, Over at the neighbor’s house until dark, a gentle breeze in limp, sun-bleached hair, and cool grass under tender bare feet. Endless blue skies, sheets of heat lightening, and a feeling of time standing still. Sailing the Milky Way, counting falling stars, and making a wish on the North Star. Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight. I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight: Please don’t let me ever forget how this feels.