Monday, August 3

The fifth season

There is a man at the end of our block who coaches a youth football team. All summer long he had a sign in his yard advertising team openings in the youth league. Since it is summer, I thought I would be looking at that sign for quite a while. But I noticed yesterday that it's not in the yard anymore. It's barely a day into August so it doesn't seem like it's time to think about football! Or is it time?

This neighbor/coach has a tractor that is rickety and makes a distinct clackety-clack when it goes by the house. He uses it to haul the football equipment from his home to the park. Our house is right between the two points so over the years it's become a traditional part of the end of summer - new school year - start of fall tradition. During football season, it goes by every week night and returns when the sun goes down. It's as constant as the smell of coffee in the morning.

Sadly, today the tractor went by. Just as I was starting to try not to notice that the sun is going down earlier and the school supplies are the main event in the Sunday paper's flyers, the sound hit me like the alarm going off on work days. It's just too soon to be thinking about fall and football and school days. I barely got used to the summer days. How quickly the seasons change. The funny thing is that the tractor is sort of soothing, like an old friend.

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