Astronomical summer is June 21–September 20.
But… culturally, unofficial summer runs from Memorial Day to Labor Day. Well guess what? This year, Memorial Day was at the earliest placement it can be on the calendar, and Labor Day is at the latest point it can fall on the calendar. This means we have the longest stretch of unofficial summer we can possibly have.
And if we want to privilege all the summer activities and ways of thinking, we can start with yesterday and go all the way through September 20.
Now that I got a tune-up on my e-bike last week — including new brake pads — and now that it’s unofficial summer, it’s like a switch flipped. All I want to do is cycle around town. I biked for 2 hours and 40 minutes yesterday, split across two rides. And if I didn’t have somewhere (also fun) to be in the evening, I would have biked even more.
’Tis the season.
Whatever you like to do during this stretch of time, make it count!
—Renee Roederer
Smuggling Grace 