Soul Snacks ☀️

2 minute read

Dear Snackers,

I love summer so much. I don’t know about everyone else, but summer for me is embossed with memories and nostalgia – I remember so fondly my summers a kid at the beach with my family, or as a teenager going to a party with friends and smooching a summer crush, or as a young adult leaving work on a Friday, borderline sprinting out of the office to head to a beach somewhere for the weekend, or even just staying in New York to rip it up in the city with whoever was sticking around. The glow on my skin and the warm hug of the summer air always brings me right back to those times, and I love it. Being a parent in the summer and working or entertaining children is not quite so carefree as the summers of my youth, but still, I love watching my kids experience the slower and unstructured pace that summer brings in many ways, reliving my youth every time I watch their newly browned little bodies jump into the water, or lick their ice cream cones. I am, in every sense, a summer person, and yet, as much as I love summer, something still always feels a little off for me this time of year. 

The summer in all of its warm-weathered, vacation-like glory, also brings with it a pause on the routine nature of the other nine or ten months out of the year, and a break from routine, for me, is often unsettling. Only as an adult have I been able to put my finger on the fact that, whenever I am out of routine or more aimless in my endeavors, it makes me anxious. My daughter said to me just the other morning that she’d been feeling kind of anxious and weird lately, and I think it’s for the same reason. 

I’m a little out of sorts, and yet, I don’t want summer to come to an end, which leads me to an important realization, if you will indulge me...embedded in this feeling I feel during summer, there is a very important lesson for me…and that lesson is, it is ok, healthy even, to be able to enjoy life even when things feel kind of off. Summer, to me, on paper, is perfect and yet in practice, totally imperfect. Summer is life’s metaphor for “everyone has issues”. Summer is that person who looks like they are always carefree and fun, but when you pull back the curtains, you come to realize they, too, are tortured in ways just like the rest of us, and that is okay. 

Uncovering an explanation for my feelings always helps me move past them more easily. When I can pinpoint the reason, I become so much more accepting of hard feelings. Being out of a routine is hard for a lot of people. From now on when I feel this “off” feeling creeping in, I’ll be reminding myself to keep moving - just shake and fucking bake, baby. It’s OK because nothing is perfect, not even summer.

-Caitlin

P.S. Some of you may have seen on IG the VERY cool videobook for kids I co-created and narrated called Violet Archer! She is a spunky little girl who loves solving mysteries, and a videobook is a great way to "watch" a fantastically written story (I didn't write it so I can say that). The videobook is based on the book "Violet Archer and the Case of the Purple Martin" which can be purchased on Amazon. Book two is available NOW and we are already working on the next videobook! Violet Archer fans are growing! Would love to hear what you think about Violet Archer and for you to share it if your family loves it, too.

P.P.S. A rockin’ Summer playlist for you! Jam to it here.