Labor Day 2010 spurs end-of-summer reflections

I never entered a bikini contest.

That must be what’s missing from this “How I Spent My Summer Vacation” essay — because frankly, the recap doesn’t look too different from the rest of my year.

There were some milestones, of course.

I attracted the usual variety of unfortunate tan lines. I indulged in my fair share of grill cuisine.

I tried (unsuccessfully) to avoid the mosquito bites that annually decorate my legs with an appealing variety of welts.

I even made my first-ever pilgrimage to Panama City — and I have sand in my luggage to prove it.

Still, as Labor Day signals summer’s symbolic end, I can’t stop craving a different kind of seasonal transition.

I remember when the school year’s start marked a clear end to warm-weather habits of oversleeping, swimming and enjoying an occasional summer fling.

We’d return to our desks — or dorms — and tell stories that were trapped in a seasonal vacuum, a vault only reopened with a designated flip of a calendar.

For most people, that changes upon entering adulthood.

Aside from a couple weeks of vacation, you spent most of the dog days of summer operating under the same regimented schedule that dominates spring, winter and fall.

References to summer’s end make you wish you were saying goodbye to something.

Your so-called “summer fling” lives 10 minutes away and is suddenly interested in a long-term commitment.

The term “barbecue” will linger in your dinner menus for the next four months.

You can’t even reminisce about the end of warm afternoons, since by now you’re probably resigned to paying crippling air conditioning bills through December.

But temperatures will cool down, maybe even in the near future.

You’ll pack up your sundresses and board shorts in the name of sweaters and thermal socks.

And at some point in your adult life, you might realize that summer’s big send-off is a little overrated.

Maybe it’s best not to view the season’s highlights in calendar-controlled vault, but make them a source of inspiration when skies get dreary.

So you didn’t relax in an exotic location or pause for pool time this year. Big deal. Celebrate Labor Day while vowing to retain summer’s emphasis on relaxation throughout the rest of the year.

It’s the only way you’ll be brave enough to finally enter that bikini contest next year.

Sonya Sorich, reporter, can be reached at ssorich@ledger-enquirer.com or 706-571-8516.