RevGalBlogPals Friday Five (on Saturday night): Summer

1. Favorite summer food(s) and beverage(s)

I love summer fruit; peaches and raspberries, especially. When it’s too hot to eat, gazpacho is my favorite thing in the world.

For a beverage, ginger-peach iced tea. Yum.

2. Song that "says" summer to you. (Need not be about summer explicitly.)

Don Henley, “Boys of Summer.” (Child of the ‘80s, I guess.)
Joni Mitchell, "Circle Game." (See below.)

3. A childhood summer memory

Girl Scout camps, 1981-88. A week-long river canoe trip and the worst sunburn ever. Primitive camping. Taking the same blasted swim test in 55-degree Hood Canal every year. Being terrified of jumping off the pier--and then doing it. Sleeping on the dock, watching meteor showers. Campfire skits.

I still sing the songs in the shower sometimes.

4. An adult summer memory

Half her life ago now, watching the Lakefair fireworks on the state capitol lawn in Olympia, with a seven-year-old honorary-niece asleep in my lap. (She just turned 14; I haven’t seen the family since I moved to California.)

Also: free concerts in Sylvester Park, every July and August of my adulthood until two years ago.

5. Describe a wonderful summer day you'd like to have in the near future. (weather, location, activities)

I have the best summer job ever, right now. I work at a retreat center/church camp, with really great people. Every day here is good.

Optional: Does your place of worship do anything differently in the summer? (Fewer services, casual dress, etc.)

No on fewer services, and we dress casually anyway. I wish I could go to Pride with them this weekend, but the first round of camp starts tomorrow afternoon.