I like books. I like the
way they sit on the shelf and hold promise. I like the little and sometimes big
insights they offer up.
And I’m not alone. A
lot of folks love their reads too. They treasure the cloth bag full of
paperbacks with Heather’s Pick or Canada Reads stickers on the front. Off to
the campground or the camp and for a couple of weeks it’s called read and
relax.
While summer might be
an optimum time to read, I always find the warmer months so busy, so full of
swimming, gardening and long hazy sunsets that I have little time to delve into
a book. But now that the season is changing and the light is leaving quicker
than the leaves, I am more drawn to the lure of turning pages and drifting off with
a tome in my lap.
That being said I must
confess that a particular library book did keep me spellbound all through this particular
summer. “The Story of the Irish Race”, by Seumus MacManus, is more like a
bookend than a book. MacManus wrote the 724 pages soon after World War One because
his encounters during the great conflict made him realize that very few people
in North America knew anything about the history of Ireland. True, his accounts
are biased. However, the amount of knowledge in the footnotes and author notes
is so interesting, so intense and so varied that I often had to re-read certain
passages to grasp the impact of them all.
It was when I started
Chapter 68, The End of O’Connell,
that I found a curious thing that sparked my attention. The first sentence of
the chapter made no sense. It began, “But the movement and the man had an
Indian summer.” Say what! What does the author mean “an Indian summer”! This
was no reference to glorious fall days in Algoma. Instead the terminology meant
that Dan O’Connell, a tired defeated Irishman, returned from a prison term and
found some residual energy to lead a movement towards Ireland’s independence from
Britain one last time. I learned that O’Connell was not successful in changing
the political climate but he did leave an important impression on the people.
The text altered my
understandings. Until reading MacManus I was bound to the thinking that Indian
summer meant warm sunny autumn days - like what’s happening right now.
Yes it is fall. In
fact, we even had a thunderstorm to announce this year’s autumnal equinox. I
recall thunder vibrating the house and an accompanying crack of sheet lightning
turning on this desktop computer. Fall arrived with the traditional bang.
Yes the warm
temperatures continue. Some days it was so hot that trying to work tested all possible
parameters. Even the trees didn’t have the energy to paint their leaves red,
gold and orange. Everything, including the forest, was all washed out.
But the words Indian
summer do have another root. Since MacManus’ book opened curiosity’s door, off
I went to pull another source off the shelf. Time for the Canadian Oxford dictionary, the heavy one,
the one that doubles as a doorstop, the one
with over 1700 pages and a three inch wide spine to come to the rescue. In it I
found the other meaning for Indian summer. Besides being “a period of unusually
dry warm weather sometimes occurring in late autumn” the dictionary states that
it is, “a late period (of life, of an epoch etc.) characterized by comparative
calm.”
This was the AHA moment
I was looking for. Yes, we are in the middle of a quiet period. We are getting
a lull in the action. If Indian summer means a respite, a chance to regroup and
enjoy the accomplishments, the fruit of what has grown, then we can see this
season with less harried eyes.
Mmmm. I think I will
head down to the beach once more and take advantage of this comparative calm. A few days ago there
had been a major blow. After it was over I noticed that the huge rolling waves had
deposited sand onto the pebbles. I’m going to clear a space in that fresh shore
and dig my toes into the last bits of my indie summer to prepare for the season
ahead.
And after next weekend
I will be thankful for more than food and family and good friends. I also will look
forward to what Winter has to write in his new book.