I've always loved my Long Island summers. Some of my fondest memories took place on Sunday mornings at Robert Moses building kingdoms out of sand or around crackling fires with smoke from my neighbor's barbecue wafting in my face. My childhood summers were full of memories like these.
As I grew older, each summer grew more unique. Though they all included the breeze of the ocean's breath, the smell of my yard's freshly mown grass, and the silhouettes of Lake Avenue at sunset, they were easily distinguishable by the grander moments that made them different.
There was no summer that I'd looked forward to more than this one: my first summer back from college. Granted, the adrenalized dreams of summer we paint in our minds are rarely ever traced out identically in reality. But this year was different. It's naive to say that college doesn't change people. I've changed. But you don't truly feel the magnitude of this fact until you return home. Especially when all you're yearning for is to find things exactly the way you left them.
As I'd said before, each summer is remembered by the events that make them unique. This summer was the summer of change -- something I've never properly learned to embrace. It was nothing I wanted, but the only thing I seemed to get. There were neighbors moving, there were friendships shifting, there was death. It didn't matter that I wanted my neighborhood to stay exactly how it was when I was growing up. It didn't matter that I wanted my closest friends from high school to find a way to be as perfect as we once were. It didn't matter that I wanted my grandparents to grow old into eternity together and for my Opa to see me make a life for myself. These things were simply happening around me.
Then one day I got in my car and drove.
I began taking myself through the winding roads of Nissequague and with the windows open, Billy Joel's For the Longest Time came on. It brought me back to the day I said good bye to my friends before leaving for college, back when I never could have fathomed the present I was living. I began thinking about all of the things I had then that I don't have anymore. Here was a song I once so fondly listened to, now causing me to feel an emotion I so strongly avoid: sadness.
As I parked my car, I found myself at Long Beach and sat myself down in the sand, still frustrated and fighting to ignore all of the now eutopic memories of summers passed. Then, the best thing happened. The sun began to set. The sky turned from a weak denim blue to a vibrant ombre of hot colors. This image didn't make me think back to anything. It didn't make me reminisce, it didn't spark a memory, it was something new and it was beautifully unlike any sunset I'd seen. And then I started to feel ok.
You hear a lot of things about Long Island summers, but there's something magical about them that doesn't revolve around egg sandwiches, Ralph's, and iced teas. People change, and though it does effect you, you can't stop them from doing so. While this might make it hard to look back at certain photos and hear certain songs, I found solace in one thing that night at the beach. No matter who comes and who goes, the wind still blows, the water still moves, and the sun still sets and as long as those three things keep happening, new adventures, new memories, and new happiness can always be found. My life is much different than it was a year ago, and it'll be much different a year from now as well and I can't wait to see what sunsets I'll find next summer.
