I wish my summers still felt the way they did when I was a child.
Sleeping on the rooftop under the night sky, playing in the courtyard, and perhaps even splashing in the pond.
Now, summer brings heat, sweat, headaches, busy days, traffic, and the constant chorus of honking horns.
I wish summer still meant opening my eyes to a blue sky overhead and realizing I had fallen asleep on the rooftop once again… rolling over onto the rug, knowing my sister had already gathered her bedding and gone downstairs.
I wish summer still meant breakfast with my mother, seated beside the sofreh in front of the samovar—still half asleep, quietly pampered—sipping tea from a curved glass and its saucer while the morning children’s program played on the radio, drifting through every room of the house.
I wish summer still meant dipping my feet into the goldfish pond in the courtyard, letting the cool water wash away the afternoon heat.
I wish I could spend my summer playing Seven Stones and Hopscotch with the girls next door, tossing the stone onto its square, my only worry being not to step over the line. And if I lost, I knew my mother would hand me a glass of khakshir yakhmal—a refreshing drink made with flixweed, sugar, and iced water—to cool me off.
Or perhaps my father would give me a qeran—a coin worth about a penny in the 1920s and 1930s—to buy an ice cream from the neighborhood vendor. As I savored each bite, every childhood worry would melt away.
I wish I could be a child again every summer… again and again. I want to remain a child forever, to see the world through a child’s eyes.
I wish that whenever summer arrived, I was still the child I once was—not the child of today, but the child I remember.
I wish I could wait for my father to come home in the evening carrying a large checkered cloth filled with cantaloupes, while my mother tossed them into the pond one by one with a splash, beside the watermelon already bobbing in the cool water. I can still remember looking forward to eating them after lunch.
I wish I were still a child, visiting Park-e Shahr, the city park, playing beside its great pond and believing, with complete certainty, that it was the biggest park in the world. Afterwards, I would proudly tell everyone I had been to Park-e Shahr, and no one would think it unusual—because that’s what children do.
When summer comes, you find yourself wishing you were a child again. But no matter how tightly you close your eyes, when you open them, you are no longer that child. You are older, wiser, and left wondering:
What happened to my summer?
You keep searching for something you’ve lost, but you cannot find it.
When you’re a child, it feels as though summer is all there is.
What happened to my summer?