If it's the end of summer...

Starting the year in January has never made a lot of sense to me. Nothing changes from December to January in Northern California. It stays cold, and dark, and rains all the time. No, the year ends and begins at the end of August. September is new beginnings: school, football, prime time television schedules. By the end of August, the grass has faded from green to yellow to brown to bone. Everything is hot and dead. The year is over.

Perhaps not coincidentally, late August is also my birthday. And every August I mark myself getting a little older, completing another year, preparing to start another. I do this by getting sick, or going crazy, or both. So I'm sitting at home with a head ache, sore throat, sniffles. I'm also stressing about all the projects I have to complete in the next two weeks. I think the stress has made me sick. No, I know the stress has made me sick.