Summer when I was young was long days and long nights. In the City where I grew up, it meant extended playing times with my neighbor friends in the ample yard of my great grandparent’s brick house. The youngsters, me included, would start to assemble at around 4 PM, right after the afternoon siesta forced to us by our parents to take, and start to play in groups, the girls together, and the boys, their own group. Before 6 PM, mothers would yell supper to their kids and everybody would wash themselves with water from my grandparents' well, the deepest, well-maintained and has the cleanest water of all wells in the entire neighborhood. Some neighbors would even do their laundry or take their baths there. Shortly after an express dinner, kids are back again and gather for the final game of the night, this time girls and boys altogether, which could be either tags or hide and seek, sometimes both, until everybody gets tired and retires to seat at my grandparents' staircase and talk about everything, each takes his or her turn to tell a story, but there were kids who had a lot to share. Most of the topics don’t make sense at all but kids as we are, were very much entertained to the facts and fiction combo and would laugh and scream in horror depending on what story was told. Tales of ghosts, giants, and vampires were favorites that time.
Summer is a time to be holy. The heat kicks off in time with the holy week. As early as Holy Wednesday, radio and TV stations stopped airing regular shows, thus, all you hear or watch are those relating to the holy season. The solemnity of the week is felt deeper by the 24 -7 reading, or singing, of the passion of the Christ until Easter, by the elderly women in the vicinity. The Holy Week starts and ends with a procession followed by a whole week of flower offerings to the Church, usually by the cutest girls dressed in white. Summer is also the time to espy the loveliest girls and handsomest boys through endless Flores de Mayo or Santa Cruzan. The Reina Elena is the most prestigious title and is usually the loveliest of them all, until in the later years when the sponsors of the Flores de Mayo designates their daughters as the Elena but even if the later is the case, the Santa Cruzan always draws crowds to the streets.
Summer is reconnecting, a time to see the people you haven’t seen in a year because they stay in Manila or Olongapo because of their parent’s work. Summer is also associating with bakasyonistas from other cities in Luzon. Summer is so full of lovely memories for me that it became my favorite season of the year, well, growing up in the Philippines you don’t have much choice of seasons, there are only 2 and I am not fond of the other- rain. I miss all these summer experiences to the point I wish my own kids to experience them themselves, like playing groups games with children their age, under the moonlight and starry nights, instead of the virtual games they play with computer terminals. I wish for them to have a chance to fetch water from the well and wash there, if there are any wells left out there. I’d like for them to experience a Holy Week surrounded by silence and hearing only the singing of the passion, children were more patient and calmer then. Summer then and there --- how I miss it.
Summer now and here? ---- heat!!!
