My Summer Intention This Year
Reflecting on how I spent summer as a kid.
Happy summer, my friends!
As I write this, it’s a sunny, cool morning in the Pacific Northwest, and I’m sitting on the porch with a hot cup of coffee, my fluffy cat laying at my feet, and the company of the neighborhood birds who flock to the porch every time she’s outside—to befriend her or bully her, I’m not sure. There’s the faint smell of the briny ocean, and the distant bark of a few sea lions. I have a wide-open day with no set plans and a fat stack of new library books, and I’m determined to lean into the slow side of a season that always makes me want to do more, more, more because it’s too nice not to.
I was home visiting my family in Chicago last month, and one night before bed, I decided to go through some of the old notebooks I kept as a kid. I found a handwritten list of all the books I read the summer I was 10 years old—talk about core memories unlocked—and reader, I was shocked to find that I had read 43 books that summer. Like, what?!
My first thought was: Wow, I’m impressed. These days, I’m lucky if I read that much in a year. My second thought was: How did I have all that time? Did I have a life outside of reading? Did I have FRIENDS? I mean, I was the kid who had glasses by second grade, knew all the local librarians by name, and got annoyed when people interrupted me while I was reading. I was a precocious bookworm who delighted in reading as many stories as I could, so maybe it’s not all that surprising. I wish I could give that younger version of me a hug. She was so rad.
As I thought about it, that number started to make more sense. School was out, and there was no summer homework. I was too young to have a job beyond my chores at home. Sure, I had dance class nearly every night, but my days were wide open to spend as I pleased. Often that meant playing outside for hours with a gaggle of neighborhood kids, or, if they weren’t around, sitting in an old wicker chair on the porch poring over books like my life depended on it. Usually, it was a combination of both. (Shout out to my parents for not filling every hour of the day with activities. I’m so thankful they valued the importance of unstructured play and chill time.)
Another reason I think I was able to read as much as I did: I chose books that were FUN. I picked books I wanted to read, not books I felt like I should read. (There have been so many times in my adult life where I picked up a book I felt like I *should* read, for a whole host of reasons, and then proceeded to slog through it). I also think 10-year-old brains are especially impressionable, and at that age, there were few things more interesting than immersing myself in lives and worlds outside of my own.
But then, I thought of probably the most important detail of all: I didn’t have a cell phone back then. My attention span hadn’t yet succumbed to the iron grip of texting, social media, checking my email, reading the news, or browsing on the Internet. There was nothing for me to reach for or distract myself with when I was reading other than a glass of water or a snack. The only pull came from my book.
How do I get back to that?!
I like to think I have a relatively “healthy” relationship with my phone. I haven’t turned on my ringer in years, and I don’t check it constantly (I also have the luxury of not having to). I keep it on Do Not Disturb in the mornings and evenings, and sometimes it takes me a few days to respond to a non-urgent text or return a phone call. I only get notifications for texts, phone calls, and the news, and while I draw a lot of creative inspiration from Instagram, I also enjoy a rich life outside of it. I’m not someone who takes pride in working on evenings or weekends or being the first to know about something.
Yet, I also recognize how delusional it is to think it’s possible to have a “healthy” relationship with a brick full of metals that controls so much of how we move through the world.
So despite all my perceived “healthy” tech habits, I still succumb to the pull of my phone. It’s not unusual for me to sit down with every intention of diving into my book, but then respond to a text or voice message “real quick,” and somehow 45 minutes later, I’ve ended up in an email or Instagram wormhole doing who knows what?! It’s no coincidence that I’ve noticed my attention span waning over the years. Anyone else?
No wonder I don’t read as much as I used to. But also, of course I don’t read as much as I used to. Beyond the pull of tech, I have way more responsibilities now than I did when I was 10. One of them being…a full-time job. I also want to be an engaged voter and global citizen (two things you don’t really think about when you’re 10), so I spend a significant amount of time reading the news, trying to wrap my head around the maelstrom of shit happening in the world—including right here in the U.S. (November should be interesting!).
Days like today—where I could spend the entire day reading if I wanted to—don’t come around very often anymore, and I want to change that. My intention for this summer is to prioritize opportunities where I can stick my nose in a book and not in a screen. I want to re-create that long, slow, magical summer vibe of my childhood, where I lost track of time because I was so absorbed in stories outside of my own.
I’ll let you know how it goes. In the meantime, I’ll be out here reading supremely fun books, with my phone and my to-do list somewhere inside, long forgotten.
I’d love to know about your favorite fun books.
Until next time,
Elizabeth
Elizabee, I hope this summer is exactly the way you want it. You are a special person, love you. G
I loved reading this and thinking about my own childhood summers! I remember my mom dropping us off at Barnes & Nobles for the day so she could work and the staff would just let us post up and read whatever we wanted. I truly missed how lost I’d get in those books!