Summer is ending. Fall begins. And then winter. My least favorite word in the English language. Just the thought of it makes me cringe. I suppose, however, that one can associate pleasantries with the season. Like hot chocolate, a roaring fire and snowmen. I will not include ice skating. That only reminds me of those long and cold northern Saturday afternoons when my mother used to send us to the frozen pond up the road, skates slung over our shoulders, while she cleaned house or baked devils food cake with coconut icing. After many humiliating and frustrating attempts to whirl around on the ice without falling flat on my face or crashing into some poor child who was fairing much better than me, I would undoubtedly find myself sitting on a snowbank, sulking and shivering, vowing to never set foot out of my room for the rest of the winter. I guess I was just not destined to play hockey or become a Brian Boitano. My mother tried to help me by getting me a pair of American Flyers with double blades, but by the time I was 16 I decided how foolish I looked in them. And besides, it was no use. I was a failure at ice skating. Watching my ankles turn inward while I was wearing any kind of footwear with little skis bolted to the bottom of them made me just too sad. So I threw them into the back of my closet and let them lie there next to my platform shoes until I inevitably hauled them out and dusted them off the next December, ready to try again.

Another reason that I disdain winter is that I fail to see anything fun in scraping and hammering large chunks of ice off of my car in the morning when I am ready to go somewhere. I recall too many mornings when I would spend the better part of a half hour in the bitter cold chipping away at my windshield to make myself a little peephole. Then I would find myself stuck in the middle of a traffic jam, more often than not because some fool was trying to make an icy incline on bald tires. I would watch them try in vain to make it up the hill sideways, while we sat in our cars, I was turning blue from an ineffective heating system. "I'm going to be late, you idiot!" I would holler to no one in particular as I popped a semi-thawed tape into the deck. Suddenly the cheerful sound of Mitch Miller and The Gang wailing "... walking in a winter wonderland ..." filled my car. A leftover Christmas tape, I thought, as my frozen finger reached for the eject button. By now the defroster had started to work and through the melting glaze on my windshield I could see a blue light rotating in the distance. For a minute I became delirious, wondering if I was really inside of K-Mart. But hearing no "Blue Light Special in our hardware department!" announcement emanating from my speakers, I could only wish that I had a cup of hot french vanilla coffee to sip from. Then again, bad idea. This was in the days before the automobile manufacturers decided how nice it would be to put cup holders in our cars, and I thought about the time I had clamped a cup of hot something or other between my knees. Clever idea. Kind of like a leg and hand warmer and beverage all in one. But someone behind me skidded on a patch of ice and assaulted my rear bumper, knocking my coffee cup backwards. And being that my seat was on an incline, of course it headed downstream. Not so clever idea after all.

Well, finally. The cars in front began to move. I creeped along the road inching my way to where ever it was I was going. Work, I think it was. Yes, that was it. I pulled into the parking lot. It had only taken me four hours. Now the trick was getting into the building. Uphill and no handrails. As I slid into the doorframe I regretted not having worn my boots or my burgundy loafers with Neolite soles. Safely inside, I noticed how quiet it was. As I was pulling off my jacket, I heard a set of feet come lumbering towards me. Before I had gotten my left arm free I heard my boss say, "Well, you made it in, Rednour. Whaddya doing wearing jeans?" "Nevermind my wardrobe. Do you know what I went through to get here? Where is everybody?" "They all called in. Anyway, they're closing the building early. You can go home now."

And so I swore that the next time I saw anything fall from the sky that even resembled a snowflake, I would leave my car keys in my coat pocket and go ice skating instead. It just seemed like a much better ride.  

I was sitting in my Queen Anne wingback savoring my morning cup of French Vanilla coffee and it suddenly dawned on me that I am actually retired. I used to think that retired meant you were old and thrown out to pasture.  But that isn't the case anymore. I know many people who retire in their 50's either because they've had it with the corporate world, or they want to enjoy life while they still have a bounce in their step. I'm sort of in-between. I wasn't really ready to quit. I was sort of thrown out the back door. Luckily I still have my bounce so I didn't land on my rump. But it got me to thinking about when I started and how it has all changed.

I no longer wear platform shoes or bell bottoms. I've stopped bleaching my hair and when I turned 30 I removed my earring. It wasn't easy transforming my gay old self into a regular person.

I remember when my mother helped me make a jump suit. No raised eyebrows or questioning looks. She was only concerned that I wouldn't choose a fabric that was out of season. When it was finished I proudly wore it to work one Monday morning, only to discover that I had to spend most of the day standing. That's not an easy thing to do when you are a clerk in a typing pool. Somehow I had measured incorrectly for the in-seam and so my herringbone jump suit was rather snug in the middle. As I said, it wasn't easy typing while standing in platform shoes wearing ill-fitting attire. Little did I know then that 20 years later I'd be wearing cargo shorts and slides. Who would have thought that we'd have piped in music to entertain us? My supervisor at that typing pool was retired from the military and she would sit at the back of the room tapping on her desk with a No. 2 pencil all day long. I tried to keep up the rythmn, but she wasn't musically inclined and would quite sporadically change the beat right in the middle of a sentence I was typing. No delete button or cut and paste option back then. They began charging me for Wite-Out. But that was Musak as I knew it. Today, I can sit at my computer, pop in a CD and listen to anything I want. I'm pretty adept at the cut and paste feature now. (Do they still make Wite-Out?)

Changes. The world has gone through a lot since I was a young adult, a mere fledgling struggling in the corporate world. While the men were wearing wing tips and pin stripes, I was scurrying from the train in my platforms and bell bottoms, so naive, but so happy. I no longer need to look at the world through rose colored glasses ; yes, I wore them too. Sometimes I wonder if, in hindsight, I'm just getting too old or the world is going by too fast. No, it's neither one. It's just change. 

As I think back on that day I walked into that typing pool in my handmade jump suit, I realize that for the most part change has been good. And I've been a part of it. I've changed and the world has changed. Now, when I need to retrieve something from the top shelf of my kitchen cupboard I put on my old pair of platform shoes.

Well, maybe I haven't really changed at all!

Heat. Summer. They go together like the black keys and the white keys on my piano. You can’t have one without the other. Well, I suppose you could, but you wouldn’t be able to play any show tunes.  I try not to venture outside in this weather any more than I have to. Not so for my friend.  Two things my dog enjoys most in life is eating and walking, though not necessarily in that order. No, I take that back. Food comes first. She's not really that fat - she just has a lot of fur. She's fluffy. You'd never guess that we lived together by looking at the two of us. Anyway, these past couple of weeks have made it very difficult for me to do anything except slouch in my wingback with a book in one hand and a pitcher of Crystal Light in the other. I'll look up every couple of pages to make sure she's still panting. Lately, her timing has been pretty good. With two or three sentences left before the end of a good chapter, I'll glance over to the door and see her sitting there sucking on her leash in anticipation of a chance to chase some poor squirrel up a pine tree. "Do I have to?" I ask her, as I surreptitiously slide my Sperry Topsiders further beneath the chair. "Stop whining and get up off your duff. It's time to go out," she tells me with her beady little eyes. "If I cross my legs any further, I'll fall over."

By the time we get back, I have all I can do to climb up the stairs and open the door. She, however, has somehow managed to survive the ordeal and has plopped herself down in front of the refrigerator waiting for her next meal. I look at her with great disdain. “Look,” I say. “I’ve told you before. There’s two meals served here. The seatings are at 8 and 6. It’s 12:30. How is it that you always manage to secure a reservation for somewhere in between?”  I, on the other hand, don’t even feel like eating. It’s just too hot. But I fix a bite nevertheless, tho I’m sure it’s just the motion of opening and closing the freezer door that makes me do it at all. While I’m taking a cool shower I’m sure she is out there scouring the carpet in search of crumbs from my Budget Gourmet. She’s grateful for any morsel of human food, no matter how tiny.

I have an appointment at 3. Two-thirty. Time to go. “Well, I’ll see you later, kiddo.” I hand her a couple of Liv-A-Snaps, but she’s wolfed them down before I’m even out the door. I crawl to my car which had been parked in the shade, but by this time even the shade has gone in search of shade. I get in. Why on earth did I pick black? I wonder. This is not good. I make the 20 minute drive with the a/c blasting on the number 4 setting, but either the trip wasn’t long enough or I had adjusted the wrong knob. Sure enough, I had the arrow pointing on the little guy’s feet. It was one of those days when you’re glad you don’t wear sandals.

I am a wreck by the time I pull into the parking lot and I ache in six different places from having tried to position myself so my skin didn’t touch my clothes. I find some relief for the next couple of hours. While I am waiting to be called, I dwell on the fact that if they can cool such a large building as this, how come my car feels like a Kenmore on Thanksgiving morning?

By the time I’m finished, I’m sufficiently refreshed and ready to go home. The return trip is a better deal. I can ride with the windows open and feel the soft, sultry breeze on my face. As I turn the key in the lock, I can hear my dog on the other side of the door, and as always, she greets me wagging her tail, then frantically searches for something to retrieve, lest she disappoint her breed. After a walk, we have a snack while we watch “The Golden Girls.” But I never made it through. I’m bushed. The weather has taken its toll. I fall asleep thinking that I should get out my knit cap and gloves to remind me that pretty soon the dog days of summer will be just a fleeting memory.