Today's the last day of our summer. Tomorrow Halina starts Kindergarten.

I have such deep affection for this past summer, our intertwined time together -- our road trips and outings and projects and play dates, and the way Halina and Luke have become so close and playful, have grown so brave together.

All these days that we made something out of nothing with our time. How creative. And in it all I had these two eager, hilarious, sweet little partners. Is it exaggerated to think of it as the last of something? Will it ever be like this again?

I can't help thinking how this particular summer is the end of pre-school and the beginning of 18 years of school-school. How everything is about to change. How it already has but I just can't see it yet, kinda like a star that's burned out.

We are reading Charlotte's Web again. We read it last year at this time, too. It's the right time. The garden spiders are getting bigger. The state fairs have wrapped up. The air has that fall note in it. Do you remember that book? How it's about loss and growing up and leaving behind and inevitable change? It just about kills me.

The last story of the Winnie the Pooh collection is about that, too. I'd forgotten. Chris read it to Halina for the second time this year also and at the end he couldn't get more than a couple words out a time because he was so choked up.

Halina found that very irritating.

Today the kids and I went to the lake. Halina's school starts up much later than other schools around here and there was almost no one at the park or the lake or the beach. It was almost like a dream I was having. Maybe more so because there have been many days like this one lately: temperate, sun dappled, empty, full of interesting possibilities and no structure, ripe with connection.

Today, Halina rode her bike on the path through the park and along the lake. (She is suddenly cavalier on the bike, seasoned.) We collected leaves. We relocated a garden spider. At the beach we built a sand house and floated boats and Luke wanted all his clothes off. Halina climbed the lifegaurd ladder and kept jumping off and asking me over and over to watch her. She made some slight variations. She surprised herself. She added a twist. She landed again and again. Luke was nursing, lying naked on me in the sun, sifting the warm, dry sand with his bare feet. It was one of those moments when things kind of hurt in their ordinary lushness. The sun was still high. It wouldn't last forever. I tried to take it all in. I focused on physical sensations: the weight of his head on my arm, his soft hair with it's wheaty palette, the feel of the breeze on my skin, the sound of someone across the lake calling a dog, the sound of Halina's feet softly thudding on the sand, Luke's small syllables of gentle questioning and acknowledging, his blue, blue eye watching me as he nursed, my breath.

But it doesn't quite save me. I can't hold on to it no matter how I try.

When I'm mourning, I have regrets. That's what happens with me, so I shouldn't be surprised. I wish I had written more in here, for example. I wish I had been loads more kind and patient.

I trust good things are coming. Amazing things. It helps to think that. And to say this was a good summer and that I am thankful. I want to remember to do that. And it's the truth.