Rediscovering Wonder: Summer Stretched Ahead

Do you remember the last day of term?

The classrooms were tidied. The books were put away. Reports had been written, exams were finished and suddenly there was nothing left to do.

For me, the overwhelming feeling was freedom.

The school year was over. There were no more tests to revise for, no more homework to hand in, no more deadlines looming on the horizon.

And stretching ahead was six whole weeks of summer.

At the time, it felt endless.

Though when I look back, I don’t remember every detail.

I remember picnics in the harvest field while dad worked.

Long bike rides that seemed to last all day.

Day trips to the seaside.

But more than any individual memory, I remember the feeling.

Freedom.

Possibility.

The sense that anything might happen.

A pile of library books waiting to be read. A new hobby to try. A place to explore. A whole summer stretching ahead, ready to be filled with whatever caught my imagination.

Somewhere along the way, many of us lose that feeling.

Our days are often planned out weeks in advance. We move from one responsibility to the next, ticking things off lists and thinking about what needs to happen next.

We become very good at being productive.

Less good at being curious.

But why should curiosity belong only to childhood?

Why should summer be any different simply because we’ve grown up?

Most of us don't have six weeks stretching ahead of us anymore, but we can still create space for possibility.

We can still follow an idea simply because it interests us.

We can spend an afternoon learning calligraphy.

Start writing letters.

Fill a notebook with quotations, sketches and half-formed ideas.

Read about a subject we’ve always been curious about.

Or simply disappear down a fascinating rabbit hole and see where it leads.

Not because it will advance our career.

Not because it is useful.

Simply because we’re curious.

That’s one of the reasons I love notebooks so much.

A notebook doesn’t demand that you already know where you’re going. It simply offers a place to begin.

A place to collect ideas, questions, quotations, observations and fragments of inspiration.

It might even become a curiosity list:

• Books you’d like to read.

• Things you’ve been wondering about.

• Skills you’d like to learn..

Don’t worry about whether you’ll find the answers.

That’s not the point.

The point is noticing the things that make you wonder.

What are you curious about this summer?