Summertime and the livin is easy

The summer solstice may not be until June, but as far as I'm concerned, summer has come. The first fruit has come, syrupy sweet: strawberries first, which became bars and two strawberry rhubarb pies in one week, followed by cherries and almost, now, apricots.

The trees along the street produce a sickeningly sweet pollen. Among those trees are too many swallows to count. Along the roadsides I spy gorgeous Rollers in all their blue and rufous glory. There are dragonflies and butterflies winging along the river.

Poppies began spreading along the roads and into the fields in April.

Outside the library.

On May 1st, roses have erupted everywhere, and they have been multiplying in a fury ever since. "Rose" in Tajik is " садбарг (sad barg)," which literally means "100 petals." A row of men sell flowers under a САДБАРГ sign every day of the year, while a restaurant behind them takes the same name, and is one of the nicest places to sit outside with an ice cream under their willow trees. 

From our kitchen window.

Ice cream is part of my daily diet. 

In America we mark the beginning of summer with Memorial Day. Here, we began May with two holidays from the Soviet era: 1 May (Labor Day) and 9 May (Victory Day). Regardless of the holidays' purpose, our celebrations were pure summer.

May 9 involved a long hike in a village. Students kept asking me why I was looking at the sky (wishing I had binoculars to look at the hawks).  I stopped and took photos of flowers, and this grasshopper, but didn't get a photo of my first Tajik toad.

I spent both days the following weekend having picnics. Sarah and I taught schoolchildren to pay modified American Football in the Botanical Garden on Saturday, and then on Sunday a group of students from the American Corner kept trying to teach me how to throw a football correctly during our daylong excursion by the river away from the city (I tried to tell them that I have been a failure at this my whole life in America, but that did not deter them from trying). 

Explaining the rules of our game

Botanical Garden Picnic.

I wear sandals every day. Sometimes I wear sunglasses. When on a picnic or kayaking, I wear a hat.

It may not be high summer - there is not yet mellon, and I can't say that "the cotton is high" - but all of these things unequivocally mean summer to me. 

Walking to the river near Палос (Palos). 

Playing Hearts by the river as the wind picked up.