I'm pondering this question as I sit in a chair in the second floor lobby of the student center at Belmont University, or "Belmont School," as J.P. calls it. Relaxing with my feet up on a table and the always melancholy Scud Mountain Boys playing as background music in my earbuds (absolutely loving "Spotify," my new on-line music find), I can look out the window and watch the traffic on Belmont Boulevard wind around the curve in front of the Circle K.
For me, summer ends tomorrow - August 20, 2011, to be precise. Why? Because that's when the students at Belmont return to campus en masse. They've been trickling in for the past couple of weeks - the women's volleyball team, the students helping with orientation, etc. A couple of girls just wandered in - freshman, no doubt - looking around, confused, then heading up the stairs to the third floor and the Curb Center.
On our nightly sojourns after dinner, J.P. and I have noticed more and more young people walking around campus. Bongo Java has been more crowded when we stop in to see who is working. Parking on Belmont Boulevard is getting harder and harder to come by. There's more pedestrian traffic on the sidewalks, more cyclists on the Boulevard and the trio of restaurants across from the school - Cha Chah, Chago's Cantina (formerly known as La Fiesta) and P.M. - are full almost every night.
For the entire summer, J.P. and I have had Belmont's campus to ourselves. In that way, it's been an endless summer of sorts, one I wish we could stay in indefinitely, because 3 1/2 is such a a great age for him and we've had so much fun spending time together here. The whole campus has been like a giant playground for him.
Together, we've run "suicide drills" on the basketball court at the Curb Center, after sneaking to look around the gym. We've watched basketball and volleyball camps in the gym. J.P. pretended to "graduate," by walking across the stage in the Curb Center, after it was set up for one of several local high school graduations held there in early summer. We watched parts of actual graduations - Father Ryan High School and Belmont (summer session). He played "garbage man" in the concourse in the gym, pushing a garbage can on rollers back and forth, shaking it to pretend like he was emptying it each time he stopped.
We've played "doctor's office" almost every night upstairs in the student center, outside the office of the dean of students. I'd sit on a bench outside the stairwell and he would call my name, pretending to be Dr. Godfrey (his pediatrician). I'd walk hesitantly into the stairwell, as he closed the door. Then, he'd open the door, go outside the get my medicine, then come back in the stairwell to give it to me. Finally, down the stairs we went, exiting through "the big door" into the main lobby of the student center.
We've played soccer together on the soccer field, such as it is (sadly, a full one-third of the field - a beautiful green space in the middle of campus is gone - torn up as part of the building project for the new law school). Early in the summer, we ran into some guys playing soccer - Belmont students - one of whom showed J.P. how to kick a soccer ball. We threw the frisbee with Jude on the soccer field. J.P. ran - a lot - all around the soccer field. We played on the tennis courts - soccer, with tennis balls and, again, ran - a lot.
We went inside the bell tower and walked up the stairs to the second floor. We listend to the bell tower chime many times. J.P. counted the chimes and, grinning proudly, announced what time it was ("It's eight o'clock, Daddy!"). We tossed change into the fountain facing Belmont Boulevard. We peaked into the cafeteria and opened and closed lockers in the hallway just outside the cafeteria.
We met students, caterers for special events, janitors, visitors and bike patrol officers. J.P. talked to them all. "What's your name? What are you doing? Where are you going? How old are you?" To a person, he made them smile and, just for a moment, forget about what they were doing, where they were going, etc. That was his summer gift to them.
Now, the students are back, or they will be, tomorrow. The signs are up, directing the new students where to go as they move into this or that dormitory, their home for the next nine months. There are traffic cones everywhere. No parking signs, too. After this weekend, J.P. and I will have to share "Belmont School" with few thousand students. That makes me a little sad, I guess, and a little nostalgic already for the summer we've shared here together. Next summer, he'll be 4 1/2 and maybe, just maybe, J.P. won't be so easily entertained by a simple walk across campus with his dad after dinner.
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