The Turn at 74

Most friends and acquaintances know that I begin expecting "the turn" sometime after my Autust 10th birthday. This year I was somewhat preoccupied with the shocking thought that, at 74, I was now in my md-seventies. While the numbers don't lie, I choose to believe the "you're as old as you feel" fallacy -- a convenient one for me right now since I feel great and still look pretty good.

Back to the turn. I think of it as the day that marks the undeniable approaching end of summer. The first signs are often subtlle. In my hometown of Temiscaming, Québec, as soon as I was old enough to stay up beyond my childhood betime of 7 PM, I joined the other kids on Elm Street for a pic-up ball game, jump rope (we called it skipping), or play games like Rover Rover and, when dark began to fall, hide and seek. Sometime after my birthday, blackness descended quickly about half an hour before the mill whistle went off at nine, when most of us usually had to be home. I would remember that the next few weeks would have to be enjoyed because the turn had come and summer's end was near. Similar signs have marked the turn in all the places I've lived.

On Saturday, I recognized the turn when I stuck my head outside the sunroom door as the sun was rising. It was definitely jacket weather. Later on, as I walking (jacketless) through the neighborhood, I felt a bit of a cold bite in the wind, and I thought to myself that the final five-minute walk home would be frigid only a few months from now, when I would no doubt bitterly regret wearing a flimsy headband instead of a hat.

However, the turn is just a reminder that we need to enjoy summer while we have it. After a few days below "normal" (a word that really means little in Minnesota, where temps often vary widely in a matter of hours), we're headed into a warming trend. There is so much summer left and, if we're lucky, we'll have a colorful fall full of warmth and beauty. For now, "the turn" is just one of the memories of my 74th birthday.