Summer is the reason I live in Wisconsin.
I love the heat and the humidity. I love how green everything gets, the way the sun glimmers off our gorgeous lakes and rivers and pools and the gusto with which people move their lives outdoors for a few short but glorious months.
There is something so in-the-moment about this time of year. Maybe we slow down a smidge, or let ease guide us more than in bustle-ier seasons. But more than that, I think we allow ourselves more pleasure. More moments of “Wow, that sunset is beautiful” and “Is that a dragonfly?” Of “Dang, this corn tastes fresh” and “Cannonball!!!”
It reminds me of why we started Northerly in the first place — to pause, notice, honor and celebrate these moments of raising kids in Wisconsin. The inspiring ones as well as the challenges, the momentous and the mundane, the things we’ll never forget because they’re awesome as much as the events that are funny only in retrospect.
They’re all worthy, they’re all real and they’re all what add up to be our lives. This is it — we’re in the wonderful, messy thick of it.
So let’s enjoy it. Let’s slick our kids with sunscreen as they try to wriggle out, pack extra snacks and bug spray for the hikes we lead them on, say yes to checking out a new park or reading the same beloved book, and let them have one more s’more even though it’s past bedtime.
Let’s welcome it all in, and soak it all up. Because, like a Wisconsin summer, it’ll be gone far too quickly.
– Katie Vaughn
Katie Vaughn is the editor and co-founder of Northerly. She is a University of Wisconsin-Madison and Stanford University-trained journalist with experience as a writer, reporter, editor, blogger and author. She lives in Madison with her husband, daughter and son, and is always up for an adventure.