What the Month of June Feels Like

The month of June feels like school papers left in empty hallways, later bedtimes, and clock-less poolside afternoons.

June holds promise of sweaty adventures had in fresh-cut grass.

June is fireflies, flip flops, and the birth of fairies.

It’s the neighbor’s music dancing through open windows.

The month of June also feels like self doubt, bathing suits, and wishing we’d worked harder on our bodies in the gray, short days of February. It reminds us our skin remembers each year, and each sunburn, even though we don’t.

It’s the month we regret nachos eaten under the invisibility of sweaters and puffy jackets.

It’s the time when we think we’ve been okay with aging but now realize that our stomach belongs to an older, more maternal version of ourselves.

It’s the month of new sunscreen and wondering whether a doctor would call a spot on our arm an age spot, were we to ask. We don’t ask.

The month of June feels like the next letting go.

We decide to try swim team, and sit in the shade thinking “He’s ready for this,” while silencing the whop-whop-whop of our helicoptering that sounds too close to “Not ready.”

Whop-Whop-Whop

Not-Read-y

Whop-Whop-Whop

Not-Read-y

We silence the whops and know that we can walk away if it’s too much for him. We hope it’s not too much for him. Swim team will be good for all of us.

We remember when he couldn’t swim, when the only water was from the bath unless he wore a life jacket that had a yoga strap tethered to us at the beach. It’s remembering the best part of the year. Of the day. Of being here. 

We think about how far we’ve come.

We’re taken to tonight.

It’s now June, and his feet leak pool on the concrete as he finds you, and his towel.

He wraps his arms around you, and water and chlorine seep through your too-old, too-maternal belly.

“You’re warm,” he says.

And we let June in. We let tonight in. 

We let this age in, nacho regrets and all.

We absorb his shivers with our age-spotted arms, our no-longer-30-year-old breasts.

We realize that being closer to 50 than to childhood is as it should be.

We sigh, and feel grateful to have eaten with our children before taking them to bed in an air-conditioned home.

If we were still a child ourselves, we’d not be holding this one, and trusting the world with him. Trusting him with the world.

If we were a child in the month of June, we’d not be able to see what the child in front of us will do with this summer. We vow to do better. 

What we’ll do with the promise of adventures in weeds and in rivers. We also can’t help but realize that these sweaty adventures will burn some of that too-old, too-maternal belly fat. But, not too much, because when he shivers from the pool or the rain, we’re warm. 

We’re warm. And maybe, that’s all we’re supposed to be in this moment, in this time. 

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This has been a Finish the Sentence Friday post. This week’s sentence is “Hey, June…”
Talk about how June makes you better, how you’ll make June better, or about the Beatles. Talk about June (and yes, I know it’s Jude but that’s the tune in my head).
The link-up will stay open through Sunday evening, so plenty of time to talk about summer, June, or, you know – the Beatles.