Summer In My Homeland

By Nefeli Pyrovolaki

After thirty-one late-morning swims, forty orange sunsets, and twelve days spent blissfully in the company of my cousins, we plan road-trips, eat fresh melon and gossip excitedly, relishing the feeling of togetherness. There is something of a haze that settles over my memory. Here, I am so far removed from winter that I have entered an almost parallel dimension. Immersed in the now, I begin to feel summer. The fresh-off-the-plane excitement, the novelty of the starry nights  ,which the cloudy winter so long denied me of, wear off and are replaced by a relaxed familiarity. I relapse into my summer rituals and before long, I am acclimated to the bare-footedness and the sleeping on my stomach (which somehow feels right under my thin bedsheet). I sleep late and I sleep in.

Sometimes I could swear that summer is a feeling, and not a season. I feel it in the early-morning air when I wake up unintentionally and the sun has barely begun its ascent. I watch it as it tints the blue sky orange and warms the 6am coolness. The cockerel crows, the dogs bark, and the crickets chirp incessantly. Outside our bedroom window, I know that an endless series of perfect tomorrows await us. "Perfect" becomes the word by which my world can most aptly be defined in this alternate reality. Filled with this thought, I drift back into a blissful sleep until the crickets reach crescendo and dawn achieves its fully-fledged morning status.

I feel summer in breakfast on the balcony, in wearing no shorts underneath a slouchy tee, in drinking freshly-pressed orange juice. Most especially, I feel it in that morning greeting exchanged with the neighbour, the shopkeeper, or the restaurant owner. The smell of my granny's biscuits drifts from out of her kitchen window, reaching the front gate. Orange zest and toasted sesame seed. We walk the corridor of bougainvillea, our pathway to the sea. Our swimsuits hang on the line, patiently waiting to dry.

I feel summer whilst I soak the midday heat on a salty rock. I always choose the smoothest, darkest rock, where the heat is greatest and I can lie comfortably. My body was made to be in the sun, I think, every trace of tension it held now having dissipated. Later we will return again, me and my sister. We know the footing by heart and scale the rocks with ease. We watch the sun fall behind the not-so-distant headlands of the island, the water dark and glimmering with its gold reflection. Its descent lasts a little over fifteen minutes. The air starts to cool again, with no clouds to trap the warmth.

I feel it when the sea is ours, the tourists flocking to their evening restaurant meal. We've spent the whole summer together, and still we find an abundance of things to say. Nothing has ever felt so much like home than this dark water, surprisingly warm. And no, it no longer feels novel, but better still, it feels known, like it belongs to us two alone. This too, we tell each other, along with everything else under the sun. Our trivial chatter lapses into reflective musing and back into girlish laughter, until we reemerge, and only the wrinkles on our fingers remain to prove the passing of time. Tired now, we begin to feel the cold. Teeth chatter, sun-bleached hairs stand to attention. Then the most beautiful part: the unruly salty hair, the soft dry fabric on my skin, the calm sensation setting in.

I feel it when dusk gives way to darkness, when the crickets lapse into their drowsy nighttime coo. Summer air, my favourite. Finally silent, we walk the way home, thinking. I feel it when we wish all those we pass goodnight, and know that that's all there really is, today and tomorrow, in our world of summertime perfection.