Hi there. I wanted to stop in, to let you know I'm still here.
Absolutely unplanned, I've been caught up in this whole business of summer. Swimming and picnics, blackberries from the backyard and a drive to the farmstand for peaches. I have tiger stripes on my toes from too many days in sandals, and was forced to retire my favourite sunglasses for a whole week in an attempt to fade the sun-given tattoo they'd left across my nose and cheeks.
I think this is what summer's all about, tumbling headlong into a season that seems exceptionally fleeting. It is a time of frivolity and that second scoop of ice cream. Of watermelon and gingham checks.
Of the particular smell of a tomato stem when snapped, fragrant of yellow and green and as fresh as all get out. A scent I wish I could dab behind my ears in February to assure myself that summer does indeed exist.
The slip of soba on a night when chopsticks and cold noodles feel just about right.
The breeze that unfolds like a sigh in the evenings as August progresses.
There's lots to tell you. I'll be back soon and I'm looking forward to it.
Hope to see you then.
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The world is indeed an amazing place. It was through mutual friends that I came to know Tara Thayer - with whom I not only share a name, but who also lives in a town where I spent many fond days as a child. She's sincere and kind, and astonishingly talented - in both her words and her images. She was generous enough to gift me one of her pictures recently, and it sums up summer in a way that makes me gasp. I thought you'd like to see it too.
Thank you Tara, I just can't get over it.