What if Summer Is Just Summer?
Written by Aria Eyde. Graphics by Aria Eyde.
The cicadas are so loud this summer it feels like the mesquite trees themselves are buzzing. The desert sky of Tucson is deep blue and cloudless under the bright white sun.
I spend the early days of June splitting my time between two things: cleaning out my childhood bedroom and trying to find a job.
Cleaning is easy and nostalgic. So much evidence of my life exists in my bedroom closet–old letters from friends, birthday cards, and scattered journals from my teenage years–everything I wrote down to remember and somehow still forgot.
Memories that used to be so important to me are just words on a page now. I remember some of it. Other parts are like reading a book of someone else’s life. I get rid of everything that doesn’t matter to me, and it feels like I’m discarding pieces of my life.
Finding a job is much harder. Tucson is empty during the summer, and nobody seems to need anyone new. But I am willing to work anywhere, and halfway through June I find a job woodworking for Jeff–an older guy with sun-spotted skin and blue eyes. I see him often when I’m home. You can find him anywhere there’s live music, chain-smoking cigarettes, and socializing with everyone.
For the next month, I work in a shed in Jeff’s backyard. The floor is covered in a heaping layer of sawdust, and shelves of paint and woodworking tools are stacked against the walls. I help him with anything he needs, but my main job is to drill holes into slates of wood: each one-fourth of an inch apart and five-eights of an inch deep. It isn’t too difficult, but the drill is huge and way taller than me. It takes all of my attention to make sure I don’t accidentally lose a finger.
Jeff works outside, where it’s often over 110 degrees. He comes in with fresh slates of wood and talks about how hot it is. Then, he gives me ice cream from his freezer, and I take my break in a bright-blue, air conditioned room of his house with his skinny orange cat.
He has another assistant, Sophia. When she’s there we take turns drilling and sanding, then talk about school and summer. But Sophia has another job working for the local election, so most of the time it’s just me.
My summer isn’t anything exceptional. I come from work sweaty and tired, then I shower and sleep my afternoon away.
I find other work watering plants for my neighbors–desert willows, agave, and sotol plants. I always water at sunset so it doesn’t dry up too quickly. I keep waiting for it to rain so that the plants don’t look so miserable.
It finally rains in July. The whole city floods, the smell of creosote is everywhere, and the scattered plants are all a little greener.
I spend my free time with the same friends I grew up with. Some days, we make pasta for dinner and watch movies in someone’s living room. Other days, I wake up in my friend Eli’s room with five people on the surrounding bed and floor. His room is the same sage green as it was when I was ten, and I start to think home is all of my friend’s houses too.
I worry about how long this will last before we all get too old for this. Life will get in the way soon and summer won’t have so much free time. I know that. But there’s something sweet about this in-between.
Summer feels slow and long but, sooner than I know, it’s September again and school is starting. I’ve stopped expecting for a season to change something about me just by existing.
I used to think summer was supposed to be an exceptional time of change and new experiences. But sometimes it’s just summer, and all of the sticky moments are small and familiar, and all of the change happens without you noticing it.
