Summer Is Trash & You’re Lying To Yourselves
By: Shani Silver
Tags: Summer, Writing, Life, Culture, Humor

@ me all you want.

Photo by Heather Barnes on Unsplash

Listen to me. Summer is not good. I’m tired of accepting everyone’s lies. I’m tired of being pegged as the grumpy or weird one because I don’t enjoy needing a shower 26 minutes after I’ve taken a shower.

“OMG summerrrrrrrrrr! It’s so much fun and it’s fun and omg summer is the best time for having fun!”

This delusional attitude hasn’t made sense since grade school. Summer as an adult is just a continuation of entirely normal life but with more bugs and you’re always thirsty.

Unlike when we were kids, summer makes life harder. It’s hotter to do literally everything, and therefore more inescapably uncomfortable. There’s no fix for being hot the way a coat solves problems in winter. There is a limit to the degree of naked we can be in public, and I venture to guess they need air conditioning in nudist colonies, too. Peddle your joys of summer nonsense elsewhere and pass me a damp towel please.

This inescapable heat and often arrogantly abundant sunshine is misery most high and you can talk to me until you’re blue (sorry, red—it’s hot) in the face about the beach (it’s far) and pools (I don’t have one and they’re expensive to go to) and ice cream (I’m lactose intolerant) and whatever else you want. Summer makes living a normal, grown up, earning-a-living life harder and I think it’s time my opinions had their day in the sun. Heaven knows everything else is out there baking already.

Hey, I know what let’s do—let’s make a season that only feels comfortable when the majority of one’s body is submerged in water. That sounds like productivity won’t be a problem. Also, let’s make wearing clothes during this time feel like being suffocated by fabric. I’m sure HR won’t take issue with whatever Ace bandage I’m wearing as a garment today because it’s the only thing that won’t contribute to heat stroke. I’m also sure I smell just fine in this meeting.

It’s not just summer by the way, I hate all manner of entirely normal things that most people enjoy. Take skirts for example. No seriously, take the skirts away because I hate skirts. They’re (always) too tight around the waist and likely to reveal your secrets at the other end. No thank you. A skirt is just a dress that gave up halfway toward its goals and I don’t like quitters.

But mostly, it’s summer I can’t abide. I also can’t breathe or stay physically dry for any respectable length of time. And yet all around me are grown people frolicking about with giant inflatable unicorns swilling glasses of pink crap and acting like life is one big Instagram. But I see you. I see the sunburn you got setting up the perfect photo for 45 minutes. I see the phone you dropped in the shallow end. I see the magnified rosé hangover you got because your body is sweating out its water at thrice the normal rate. I see how much more you spend on Lyfts half the year because the subway is the cruelest summer mistress of all.

I shall no longer be made to feel like a meteorological outcast by a population that routinely covers its eyes to the truth about summer with popsicle sticky hands. I will proudly express my distaste and distrust and don’t come cryin’ to me when you find sand in your bed.

There’s room in this life for all sorts of seasonal opinions. It’s just that when it comes to societal takes on summer, you’re all extremely delusional, dehydrated, and wrong.