Lament for the Last Day of Summer

We had a bright idea. We decided that today we were gonna ignore proper tradition and all that is right and decent, and follow the weather people's lies and pretend that today is the last day of summer. Then we thought we could celebrate the autumnal equinox on its proper day and get two end-of-summer celebrations for the price of one. We do love a festival.

But in retrospect it's not really worked out like that. Instead of a happy celebration of the good days gone by, golden days of endless sunshine and mellow evenings of soft talk and barbecues, it turned more into a time of wistful regret. The banner hanging over the garden was a real mistake, admittedly.  "The harvest is over, summer is ended, and we are not saved". The frail swallow of summer is soon to fly into the closed patio doors of autumn.

But so many summers can end like this. The wasp-blighted apples, the plum crop that failed. The barbecue where everyone got salmonella. The Pimms party where we forgot the lemonade and had to drink it neat (although that wasn't so bad). The wet grass every time you wanted to sit on it and enjoy the day. And every year the image of a perfect summer, the one we could have had but just missed.

Still, maybe next year. There's always one more drop of the summer wine....