An ode to summer

If you rearrange the letters in SUMMER you get the word freedom.
Okay, so maybe not so much the exact word freedom but you get the sense. No school, no schedule, no snow, no boots just bare feet, pools and hayfields.
Summer in Nebraska means cool, humid dawns that rapidly dissolve into hot, muggy mornings which then transition into hay weather by early afternoon: hot and dry with a little breeze blowing in from the south. Clouds often build from wispy, thin strips on the western horizon into monstrous thunderheads by the time the sun sets. They rumble, deep, throaty voices making the whole plains shake. Time seems to stand still in those moments as the inhabitants of the summer plains wait to see if blessed rain will pour from the sky or if a sharp crack of lighting will steal the hard work of their hands from them in a flash of fire.
Freedom is playing with kittens all morning in the cool shadows of the house then clambering into the pool when the afternoon with it's oppressive heat comes sneaking along. It's spending so much time swimming that little red heads fade to blonde and freckles become more prominent.
Every day is spent gathering in the summer grass so that a little piece of the warmth can be unfurled when winter finally does come. A long arduous process that can seem monotonous becomes an adventure as the first few fawns of summer peep their heads above the long prairie grass and turkey nests come alive with baby chicks as the tractor roars close to their home. The sweet smell of mowed grass mingles in the air with the heavy fragrance of the wild plum bushes as they bloom in the humid summer evenings.
It's the first few sips of sun tea when the heat of the day is still lingering in the jar. It's the feel of laundry right off the clothesline, crisp and warm from time in the sun. It's racing back while chasing cattle as a storm closes in from the west. It's going to summer camp, having friends over, and celebrating birthdays. It's target practice and fair time. It's vacation Bible school and the croaking of frogs in the dam below the house.
Summer is freedom. hayfields, swimming, and thunderstorms.
The season is short and you have to savor every single moment, saving it to remember when the snows blow in and the temperature drops below zero.
Those sweet, free days of summer never last long. School starts too soon and before long those simple days of kittens and pools are just a happy memory.
Until next summer.

The end of a never ending road

The long road home

It's one pale stretch of gray pavement that mars the otherwise flowing green hills of northern Nebraska. Marching in a straight line from north to south, the road is the conduit through which the small trickle of travelers hurry through the most beautiful part of Nebraska on their way to somewhere "more important."
It runs from river to river, with only a hill or two to break the monotony. But the distance is short and the road is simply the most convenient way to connect two points rather than a grand display of the benefits of American infrastructure.
The road seemingly stops just beyond that last rise. It crests the valley hill then simply disappears. That's where the world ends.
Sure, there are towns that exist beyond the edge of the river but they are inconsequential. The road, for that matter, is of little consequence as well. While hours may go by without a vehicle traversing the gray expanse, the fields and gravel roads, invisible from the highway teem with life. Cattle wander from pasture corner to pasture corner, grazing slowly on the tall blades of summer grass. Mowers hum and buzz as they make sweep after sweep around fields slicing down the grass to dry before a rake sweeps it up to be baled, a little piece of summer that will be served during the long cold winter that inevitably follows the summer warmth. Children play and laugh in makeshift pools and creeks,the tumbling, rushing water cutting valleys into the prairie floor. All this activity happens in the byways and hedges along that solitary stretch of road far from the rush of traffic that plagues other parts of the state. Life happens away from the road, houses are built miles from the highway with dusty country lanes creating spidery maps over the fields.
Most locals' commute takes them out onto the road; mothers in their vans and suburbans cautiously making their way onto the highway to take their young children to the little schoolhouse, fathers in big pickup trucks lumbering away to tend to the cattle, teens zipping past on their way out of the hollow to the high school far from the straight road. But the road never rushes like the interstate, with cars ebbing and flowing over it like the river over rocks.
The road, a straight arrow to the heart of the heartland, leads the wandering children back again to the world from the abyss beyond the river. Just to follow that lonely, empty road will eventually bring the wanderer home.