Until the beginning of this week, the weather has been so warm here that I was getting lulled into thinking it was still summer. While I’d prefer that it not be 85 degrees in October, the ongoing heat suggested that time was standing still.  Had we finally found that “Hold” button I’m always wishing for?  It almost seemed so.

But the world must be spinning, and moving in its orbit.  Monday’s rain ushered in more seasonable temperatures.  It triggered the pine straw showers that turn our driveway and the hill beside it golden-red every October.  We had one beautiful, crisp fall day.  Yesterday brought cold, insistent rain, and it continues today.  It’s time to search out my gloves and the rest of my warmer dog-walking gear.  But I need one last look at summer.

A bit of summer’s essence is preserved in the photo above.  It shows our daughter and two friends on stand up paddle boards this August.  It was just before sunset, the air was unusually balmy, and Cape Cod Bay was calm and smooth.  It was toward the end of a very special day, when we had a visit with friends from home.  This was an unusual event.  We don’t typically see Virginia friends in Massachusetts.  Our Cape friends and our home friends have, until now, remained completely separate; they inhabit two very different worlds.

But this year, our neighbors decided to vacation in Plymouth.  This is the family with whom we often spend Thanksgiving.  We met them when D and their younger daughter began Kindergarten together.  The girls have been close ever since.  Their friendship is not of the on-again, off-again type.  It’s not stained by gossip, catty commentary, competition or envy.  They never discussed being “best friends.”  It’s a friendship that doesn’t require numerical ranking or constant rebooting.  The two girls are not and needn’t be exactly alike.  But they seem to have a genuine regard and respect for one another, and a true appreciation for their differences.  They have a rare thing going. This kind of comfortable companionship doesn’t happen often.  If we’re lucky enough to find it, we need to hold onto it.

All during elementary school, the girls had a standing Tuesday playdate.  It’s been a pleasure to watch them together through the years.  I would peek in as they made up games in the playroom, watch from the window as they dashed around the yard in the sprinkler or performed acrobatics on our rope swing.  They were nearly always laughing, and their friendship struck me as familiar.  I could see me with my childhood friend Katie, with whom the most mundane activity could be fun.  She and I shared a similar bond, and it’s one that has endured.  I expect that, in years to come, D and her friend will eagerly catch up with one another during winter breaks from college.  I’d be very surprised if, thirty years from now, they’re not exchanging Christmas cards (or whatever kind of virtual correspondence has taken their place by then).

The older daughter is now a high school senior.  Her interest in several New England colleges prompted the family vacation in Plymouth.  The ideal elder sister, she is patient, encouraging, grounded and wise.  She has never been above socializing with her sister’s younger circle.  My daughter considers her a good friend and trusted advisor. I find it reassuring to know that the three girls are all, for this one year, in high school together.

The two photos above show the friends at our local Memorial Day carnival in 2008. When our girls were in elementary school, this event was an annual tradition, not to be missed.

These kind and thoughtful sisters, as would be expected, embody the same values as their  mother and father.  Once you’re a parent, your child largely determines your friends.  The parents of your child’s friends become the people with whom you spend time, like it or not.  Our daughter chose well for us;  we are very fortunate.  H and I enjoy a real sense of camaraderie with the mother and father and with their two girls.  It was a welcome turn of events when it happened that our families would be in the same area at the same time for our summer vacations.

The day that our friends were arriving in Truro, we were filled with anticipation.  Text updates told us they were getting closer.  When they pulled into the shell-paved parking lot, we were crossing the green to meet them.  D was excited to show her friends her favorite summer place.  We knew the whole family would appreciate the bay and its charms.  They wouldn’t be put off by the seaweed.  They’d find the odd marine life amusing.  They wouldn’t wonder why we didn’t opt for more luxurious housing.  They would enjoy Provincetown’s beauty as well as its eccentricities and humor.  The day would be relaxing, easy and fun.

And it was.  It was a lovely day.  There was time to sit back in beach chairs on the flats during an impressively low tide.  Time for the girls to create a big moated sand castle.  Time to watch the water reclaim it and most of the beach.  After an early dinner at the Lobster Pot, with no crowd and no wait, we wandered among Ptown’s unique sights.  We returned as sunset approached so D and her friends could try out the SUP boards.  The water was gloriously tranquil.  The typical chill of the evening never descended.  We talked, laughed and watched our girls floating happily on the smooth, glassy bay.

The photo of my daughter and her friends on the water is my parting  summer shot.  It captures the luxurious ease and the rhythm of summer.  And it speaks of the promise of friendship to transcend the seasons and the years.

As I’ve mentioned, just a mile down the road from our quiet cottage on the beach in Truro is bustling, partying Provincetown, incredibly rich in its offerings of theatrical and musical entertainment.  This small seaside town has been a mecca for the visual and performing arts since the turn of the twentieth century. We try to sample something new every year.  But no matter what else we do, we always devote at least one late night to the music of Bobby Wetherbee.  

The ageless Bobby Wetherbee has been entertaining audiences in Ptown for fifty years.  From June to October, Thursdays through Sundays, he’s at his piano in the lounge of the Central House at the Crown & Anchor.  He’s a beloved icon, and our family understands why. 

Bobby’s musical gifts were evident early.  He recounts how, at age three, he sat down at the piano and simply began playing fluently.  Shepherded by his mother, who gave up her own acting career to be his manager, he was performing by age six.  He trained in voice, piano and acting, first in summer stock and private lessons, and  later at the New England Conservatory.  He’s had long-running gigs in New York, at the St. Regis (in the famous King Cole Bar) and at the Carlyle, and in Boston at the Copley Plaza.  Bobby makes his home in Boston and spends winters in Palm Beach.  But summer finds him in Provincetown, and Provincetown sure is lucky. 

We discovered Bobby twelve years ago as we were walking with my husband’s parents down Commercial Street after dinner.  We were drawn to  lively, infectious music spilling out from the Landmark Restaurant, where he was playing at the time.  A vivacious, strikingly tan man was holding forth at a piano positioned immediately by the open window.  A tightly packed crowd surrounded him, singing along enthusiastically.  The song was a family-friendly standard, perhaps Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah or Do-Re-Mi.  Our preschool-age daughter knew it as well as we did, and we all joined in.  My husband took her in his arms so  she could get a better view.  When Bobby noticed our group, he sang the rest of the song directly to our little daughter.   We added our appreciative applause to that of the patrons inside, and Bobby blew D a kiss.  She was delighted.  We all were. 

After another year of enjoying a too-short taste of Bobby’s music from the street outside, we all agreed:  we wanted more.  Since then, we always catch Bobby’s show.  Sometimes H and I go with his sister and her husband.  Sometimes H’s parents join us.  Sometimes we all go.  We’ve brought our daughter along many times. 

Bobby’s performance is compelling in its vitality. His repertoire is wide-ranging, but he favors classics and show tunes from the 1940s on. He doesn’t pause between numbers; he doesn’t take breaks.  In fact he never seems to tire.  One song segues smoothly into the next.   He may hold a final note for an improbably long interval, never losing volume or breath, before launching, with gusto, into the next song.  He pauses only to take the occasional exuberant swig from his ever-present water bottle.  One medley transitions into another, and the momentum builds: Dorothy Fields, Cole Porter, George M. Cohan, Irving Berlin, The Sound of Music, and on to Chicago. He may include a couple of his own songs, perhaps the spirited break-up song History, or the poignant That’s a Lie (which he wrote at age twelve).  You get the sense that Bobby knows what it means to win and lose at love, and to celebrate life, with humor and compassion, through the good and the bad. 

The unique appeal of Bobby’s show is hard to explain.   Certainly he has heaps of talent, but it entails far more than talent.  I’ve been to piano bars, to British pubs, where the crowd sings along happily, and it’s fun.  But Bobby makes the experience truly special.  His presence is effervescent, warm and outsized, and he is extraordinarily generous.  Nearly every night, he welcomes a professional or amateur to step up to the piano for a solo.  Sometimes it’s a fellow musician visiting from out of town, or a young performer fresh from a local revue.  Often it’s Tony, Provincetown’s ebullient Director of Tourism.  Bobby’s encouragement and his nuanced piano playing bring out the best in a singer.

Or would-be singers.  Bobby’s generosity extends to his entire audience. Not only does he invite the participation of everyone in the room; he somehow convinces each one of us that we’re really good. He brings us in almost conspiratorially, makes us a crucial part of the show. Toward the end of All that Jazz, he slows down the tempo and proclaims, “OK kids, this is the time when we sell it!”  You find yourself thinking:  he needs us; he can’t do it alone!  And then the entire room resounds joyously with “You’re gonna see your Sheba shimmy shake, and all that jazz!  She’s gonna shimmy till her garters break!  And ALL THAT JAZZ!!  We’re all in show biz, and gosh, we’re terrific!  Bobby makes you believe it, and you love him for it. 

An evening with Bobby Wetherbee attests to the unifying, civilizing power of music.  The audience at the Crown & Anchor spans generations and is diverse with a capital D.  But with song after song, false boundaries and perceived differences–all the stumbling blocks we set up to keep us apart–they melt away.  By the time the standing-room only crowd combines voices to join our gracious, considerate host in God Bless America, or another patriotic favorite, the dream of peace on earth seems not only possible, but likely. 

This photo, taken in August after a show, captures Bobby’s generosity, kindness and warmth:  he hugs me as though I’m the star.  He makes me think, while I’m with him, that I could be.  That’s why he’s the real star. 

Thank you dear Bobby, for the music.   We’ll see you next summer. 

The backyard of my childhood home in Atlanta, like most of those in the neighborhood, is narrow but very deep. It has two distinct sections, which my friends and I differentiated in this way: the area just behind the house was the back; the more remote area was the way back. Sometimes, for emphasis, we called it the way, way back. The same terminology, of course, referred to the seating arrangements in those old station wagons from the 60s and 70s (including our 1965 Dodge Polara, with its rear-facing seat, as well as the one appearing in a current movie of the same name.)

We bought our house from a family with four children who played in every inch of that yard, as the numerous toy soldiers, cap guns, pen knives and dolls with mold-encrusted eyes, found in the unlikeliest places, attest. In 1968, when we moved in, the landscaping left much to be desired. There were a few azaleas and some dogwoods in a wide-open sea of scraggly weeds and spots of bare earth. We didn’t devote much time or thought to real gardening; we had more than enough to keep us busy with the ongoing renovation of the house and the rehabilitation of the extremely patchy front lawn.  (See Morningside Begins its Comeback, July 2012.)  But a mere four decades plus later, in the absence of an army of hard-charging children, nature has worked its own special magic.  Behind the house now lies a sort of enchanted urban jungle.

It’s not that we stood by and did nothing.  In that case the house would now be completely hidden by a tangled Sleeping Beauty thicket.  Daddy has always been out there clipping and pulling weeds.  Since his retirement, he has spent the greater portion of his waking hours combating  the constant, determined creeping of the vigorous, semi-tropical plant life that thrives immediately outside the walls. If it’s daylight, Daddy is pruning, pulling ivy, gathering fallen sticks, clearing away the ongoing accumulation of natural debris. Nearest the house, in the back, Daddy’s efforts are keeping nature’s tentacles in check, to some degree. Atop the steps leading from the rock garden, there is a central area that to this day remains recognizable as an actual yard.

Further back, however, the battle has long since been lost. The way back luxuriates in a state of benign neglect. With my every summer visit, it’s substantially lusher, more enclosed, more overgrown. Every year, the vines have thickened, reached higher, delved deeper. Nature’s resolve to have its own way is everywhere in evidence.

When we bought the house, the way back was especially barren, strewn with pine straw and sprouting a few weeds. It was here that Daddy set up my red and green metal swing set. Brand shiny new when I was two, he assembled it behind the small house in suburban Lexington where I was born. While our family bounced around from Kentucky to North Carolina during Daddy’s graduate school years, the swing set found a temporary home beside the chicken lot at my grandparents’ farm.  Once we settled in Atlanta, it settled there with us. In the theatrical production of my childhood that runs in my head, that old swing set is a crucial backdrop, an essential set piece. It boasted none of the fancy components seen in today’s typically elaborate play sets–no castle, fort, or climbing wall–just a two-person glider, a couple of swings, a trapeze and a slide. It was nothing special, but it was where my friends and I gathered. Located, as it was, in the remoteness of the way, way back, it was where we met to play, to pretend, to talk, to argue, to make plans. It was our place.  A kids’ place.

Not all memories the swing set conjures are idyllic ones. Several years during elementary school I struggled with the mind-gripping demons we now refer to neatly as OCD.  It didn’t have a name back then. Thanks to the patience and understanding of my mother, who had experienced a similar near-insanity as a child, I managed not to fall apart completely. Mama sat at my bedside every night, when I’d tell her each worry, and she’d tell me not to worry.  A general, all-encompassing “Don’t worry” meant nothing.  I needed her to respond to each anxiety individually.  It was exhausting for both of us, but she never complained.  During the school day, when I was occupied, I was OK. I don’t think any of my buddies knew I was crazy.  In the late afternoons, if I didn’t have the company of friends, the beasties roared back, preparing for the free-for-all of night. They often demanded my fealty in the isolation of the way back. I can see myself running yet one more time around the swing set, zipping joylessly down the slide again and again, touching the rusty spot on the top bar just once more.  I have to do it.  No, I didn’t touch it exactly right. I have to do it again. I’m a weary, restless, ten year old nervous wreck. Fortunately for me, that time passed.  I either outgrew the demons, or they got bored and went on to torment another, more defenseless child, one without as compassionate a mother.

As a high schooler, having learned a few moves on the rickety uneven parallel bars during gym class, I used the high bar of the swing set to practice. With the picnic bench positioned below, I could propel myself onto the bar and execute back hip circles. I shudder to think how close I must have come, repeatedly, to flying off and breaking my back, my neck, or worse.

During my college years, there were fewer hours to be whiled away in the way back, and nature asserted itself in earnest.  The wooden seats of the glider rotted and disappeared.  The slide weathered to a warm, rust red.  A few vines, wisteria and grape, managed toe holds and began to wind their way up, across and over.  One hard plastic swing was anchored in place by a vine that braided itself delicately along the length of the chain.   Year by year, each element became more firmly rooted, more tightly entwined. 

The vines might have held the swing set up for decades to come, had not a nearby giant tulip poplar been tossed onto the slide during a lightning storm.  While one side is crumpled like a broken toy, the other still stands, held fast in the candy cane clasp of a massive wisteria vine.  The glider is locked in place, as well, vine-trapped.  Vinca, ivy, Virginia creeper and mahonia flourish along the ground.  Unchecked plant growth closes in from every direction.  Going on right now, and for the forseeable future, at least, it’s a wild foliage riot in the way, way back.  In the midst of it all, my old swing set remains, ever more adorned, yet ever more fragile, a monument to simultaneous decay and growth.  A monument to life, and its circle.