Celebrating the End of Summer

Amid all the Trump hate and Kamala love in today's New York Times, an article entitled "How Should We Mourn the End of Summer?" caught my eye. The author moans, "The season's conclusion can spark a sense of loss" because "the plans and possibilities of summer cease." She/he grieves the kayaks and beach chairs being stored for the winter and those speculative camping trips that never happened. All I can say about that is "Boo-fucking-hoo."

Where I live in Maine, summer pretty much sucks. A common misconception is that it's always colder up here, but our summer is often as brutal as anywhere, except of course in Florida, Phoenix and Hades. 

Not only does it get very, very hot and very, very humid on many, if not most days from June through September, sometimes into October, but we have bugs like nobody's business. Green flies that bite. Black flies that bite. Mosquitoes, of course that bite. And most especially, our very own Browntail moths, which are found nowhere else but in Africa and New England and which make you want to tear your skin off. Here's a bit of info about them from the CDC website:

The browntail moth is an invasive species found only in Maine and Cape Cod. This moth is an insect of both forest and human health concern. 

The browntail moth caterpillar has tiny poisonous hairs that cause dermatitis similar to poison ivy on sensitive individuals. Most people affected by the hairs develop a localized rash that will last for a few hours up to several days but on sensitive individuals the rash can be severe and last for several weeks, or longer. 

The rash results from both a chemical reaction to a toxin in the hairs and a physical irritation as the barbed hairs become embedded in the skin. 

Respiratory distress from inhaling the hairs can be serious. Caterpillars are active from April to late June. Hairs remain toxic throughout the summer but get washed into the soil and are blah, blah, blah ....

As one of those "sensitive individuals" I celebrate the end of summer, which by the way will not come for another three weeks. So all you sad sacks take heart: There's still plenty of time left to contract Eastern Equine Encephalitis (EEE), the latest designer mosquito bite that can kill, or maybe get sun poisoning or lose a limb to a shark or succumb to dehydration or drown in your overturned kayak. 

As my father would say, it could happen.