What ever happened to summer?

It’s the middle of July.  To an 8^th grader in the 1980s this was a time for trying to get yourself invited to a community pool.  Apparently, our community pools didn’t embrace the entire community.  He who has not the $100 season pass, need not approach these gates.  Oh, but those occasional guest passes were a glorious thing.  Barring that invitation, you might consider the option to hop the fence.  But the lifeguards would take one look at your lame breaststroke and know you weren’t a local.  “You are kindly invited to exit the premises, junior.” Cast out of Eden, shamed but determined to return. 

I’m fairly certain that this was the ONLY thing on my mind that summer, and the several summers that followed. 

To an 8^th grader in 2023, the middle of July bears little resemblance.  10,000 rides to 10,000 programmed youth sporting events.  Three of mine are even playing basketball.  Basketball.  The winter sport.  In mid-July.  And let’s not even get into the camps and the other “educational opportunities.”  I just heard about one where kids spend the summer learning computer code!  How awful.  But I digress.

I am learning a lot as a kiddie chauffeur.  For one, I can give more precise directions than Google Maps to any park or high school field in our surrounding three counties.  I could probably put Rand McNally out of business if Rand McNally isn’t already out of business.  This skill should come in handy someday for precisely nothing.  For another, I have learned that Tik Tok is absolutely hilarious.  Like gut-busting hilarious.  I tried watching it once.  Unintelligible.  But the cackles of the three teenagers hovering around one phone in my back seat are proof.  It must be hilarious.

Come to think of it, funny has changed too.  I wonder what they would think if they saw that Eddie Murphy video from the 80s.  You remember it – it was a VHS tape that some older kid gave to some other older kid whose little brother found it and popped in the VCR when ALL of our parents were at work.  Now THAT was funny.  But it probably wouldn’t hold up.  Eddie Murphy. VCRs. Parents at work.  All unrelatable to them.  Quaint actually.   

Enough is enough.  Since time immemorial, it was a given that 25% of a kid’s first 18 years was reserved for wasting time.  I think most of you will agree.  We have to get back to that.