Summertime, Summertime, Sum, Sum, Summertime!

If I have been remiss in not posting any blogs for a couple of weeks, you can blame it on the onset of summer-like weather here in Ottawa.  Being able to get the outdoor furniture from its winter dungeon, watch the grass and trees start to turn green, and contemplate the possibilities for golf this year are all part of the phenomenon.  Mid-twenties temperatures don’t hurt either. 

Of course, summer also means baseball and golf. For a player, golf is a game you can play all your life.  It gets you a few hours outside walking and swinging, and can lead to meeting some nice people.  Baseball is the most social of spectator sports.  Unlike hockey or football where you always seem to be surrounded by yelling and screaming, baseball, with its more leisurely pace, allows social interaction.  It is a great way to spend an afternoon or evening with friends or family, particularly children or grandchildren.  What could be better?

We all look forward to this time of year, even, I suspect, die-hard winter sports fans.  Of course, like all Canadians, we find some problem with the weather, no matter how perfect it appears.  My dour, old Scottish Grandma, on a lovely summer day, would inevitably observe, “We’ll pay for this.”  Canadians, and apparently Scots, cannot seem to believe that there is any such thing as a perfect day.  However, I would point out that these sudden warm days of spring, with their moderately hot temperatures, low humidity and cool nights, sure must come close.

I have experienced summer in a number of places and climates.  I grew up in Hamilton, Ontario where the sooty air could become so oppressively hot and humid.  I spent a few summers in Victoria, British Columbia where you could have some absolutely fabulous summers interspersed with summers of what seemed to be constant rain.  In Halifax, too many summers were spent waiting for the coastal fog to clear.  I was there in 1967 where ships from navies all over the world gathered for a Naval Assembly to honour Canada’s Centennial.  The fog was so persistent during that week that the only photograph that captured the entire fleet was taken at two o’clock in the morning when the fog had cleared for a few hours.  I survived two summers in Charleston, South Carolina where you treated those months from June to August the same as we spend winter here – mostly indoors.  The heat combined with the coastal humidity restricted outdoor life to early morning or late evening.  From four to seven o’clock every evening, a band of thunder storms would pass through Charleston and vicinity.  It might not rain at your home every evening, but you could guarantee it would rain someplace.   My wife spent two years in Florida and the weather was much the same there in summer.  I must admit, however, the other nine months of the year in Charleston were worth the three months of an uncomfortable summer.

For all of the complaints we may have about summers in eastern Ontario, our summers aren’t really so bad after all.