Summer Dreams and Nightmares

Students and teachers are often sure that the best season of the year is the summer. The former believe so because they can sleep late and not go to school while the latter get paid of doing nothing, at least in theory.  Yet, for some parents, summer vacation is a three month period of service as entertainment director, ATM and community police officer.  No wonder, most parents view September 1 as the real independence day.

Geography also plays a part in seasonal feelings.  Residents of countries in the far northern and southern hemispheres, such as the Scandinavian countries, as well as those with long rainy winters, notably Oregon and Washington where I lived, long for the bright sun of long summer days. Such people spend every possible minute outside soaking in the rays.  By contrast, in Israel, where I live now, and other hot places, the summer means that you can only be outside for a few hours in the morning and a few hours in the evening due to the grueling temperatures.  Like those suffering parents, we long for the coming of the autumn, when air conditioning and three showers a day are no longer necessary.

Sentiment regarding to the summer is also affected by one’s profession.  To work year round, a person would have to be both a ski instructor and life guard.  Farmers and hotels make hay in the summer, sometimes literally.  By contrast, all that coat and boot producers can do is hope for a cool fall and winter.  Firefighters must have similar feelings.

Age confuses the issue.  Almost nobody remembers being too hot as a child.  Whether this lack of recollection is because summers were less hot, people’s memory are short or kids don’t suffer from weather, I don’t know.  By contrast, the older we get, the more the temperature seems to affect us, both cold and heat.  This sensitivity is quite sad, but apparently unavoidable.

Finally, there are those for whom it makes no difference.  People with jobs in malls and offices exist in controlled temperatures whose work load is basically unaffected by the outside world.   This is the exact opposite of police in the street and construction people of any kind, who are intimate with their daily weather.

So, if beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, so is our perception of the summer.

France, the French, and Love/Hate

Almost nobody feels neutral about France or the French.  Many people adore France but hate the French.  There are probably a few who feel the opposite.  Some people love or hate both.  Whatever the case, it is rare to anybody say, I went to Paris.  Nothing special.

I am among those who love both France and the French, but not enough to want to live there.  France is a country where living is an art, whether it concerns food, clothing, or conversation.  By contrast, making a living is a necessity and a bit proletariat in the negative sense of the word.    Parisians constantly talk about restaurants, vacations, and movies or books.    So, while French emphasis on living may seem rather decadent to more protestant-thinking people, it is rather attractive and even addictive.

By contrast, to be diplomatic, the French themselves are not always appreciated, even by themselves.  Many people are quite offended by their arrogance and rudeness behind the formal level of politeness.  Being half American and half French, I have no problem understanding their attitude and even enjoying it.  There is a sociological concept called a zero sum world, typical of peasant societies, in which a finite, fixed limit exists for everything, material and immaterial.  There is only so much money and love in the world.  Therefore, to ostensibly show one’s money means that the people watching have less, an unpleasant feeling.  Similarly, in friendship, people have a limited space for love, i.e. childhood friends and close family.  This is creates an us and them world.   Friendship is total for the us group and basically non-existent for the them group.  Fortunately, Paris has a high percentage of non-French.  I belonged to the both to the us and the them.  As any obnoxious attitude was not personal against me, I found it amusing at time, like live theatre (of the absurd).  It is like watching a bunch of children trying to act like adults, ultimately very entertaining.

Of course, living in Paris is another story.  Paris is a small, dense, tense, and intense city with too much air pollution, strikes, and bureaucracy.  Also, for people used to seeing the sun most of the year, the weather is depressing.  Maybe Paris is like New York: a place for young people with lots of energy.

Still, I visit Paris at any opportunity and feel sadness each time I  part from it.   My fantasy wish would be the ability to transport myself instantly to Paris and enjoy a baguette, a good piece of cheese, an old dusty chaotic book store, and petit pain au chocolate or chocolat liegoise.  Ah, sometimes, la vie est dure sans confiture.