Summer – Everett Leader Herald

The dead of summer

Melkanie Riberio and Ashley Carmo leap into the DCR pool to cool off on July 2. (Photo By Jim Mahoney)

It’s time to slow down and enjoy each day

By JOSH RESNEK

It is the dead of summer.

It is the moment in the summer upon us when there is more summer in front of us than behind us.

It is that time of the year we tend to exult in because we know how quickly it will pass and how drastically the earth changes around here in a matter of months.

It is a time to enjoy the lengthy days and the light of the early morning.

It is a moment and a time to say who cares about the mayor?

Who cares about city hall or the city council or the school committee?

Confessions of a wannabe gardener

thumbnail copy — Josh Resnek’s vegetable patch includes kale, potatoes, tomatoes, peppers, peas, corn and, with luck, cucumbers. (Photos by Josh Resnek)

Greenhorn green thumb

BY JOSH RESNEK

I grew up in a household where we had lovely grounds and more than a handful of exotic flowers and shrubs and mature trees.

My mother liked watching the flowers she planted come to bloom.

My father had an interest in everything about our grounds looking just right, especially the grass, but he never planted anything in a lifetime, and he lived to be 91.

It is said the apples don’t fall far from the tree.

In my lifetime I have never planted anything, not a seed, not a flower, nothing…until last month.

With the aid of my lawyer son, who is cultivating several acres of land in Greenfield where he is practicing law, a small garden was planted in my backyard.

I built the wooden framework, which frankly was idiot’s work, proving I was thoroughly qualified to build it!

My son used the rich soil from my backyard to carve out a garden plot about 200 square feet.

He used a variety of tools, something like a pick axe to break up the soil, his hands to shake the soil free of growth, a shovel to place the soil in the box and then his hands again to do the plantings.

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Virus questions haunt summer

Screen Shot 2020-05-29 at 10.32.22 AM — Hasan Bush, of Casablanca Barber Shop, trims Paulo Olivera’s hair on Monday. (Photos by Jim Mahoney )

Locals still wear masks as some claim crisis is over but deaths continue to rise

By JOSH RESNEK

Memorial Day weekend has come and gone.

The traditional starting point for the American summer of 2020 has begun with big question marks about how it is going to turn out with the virus still making millions of us tentative about what we can do while many millions of others believe going out and enjoying themselves is far more important than being kept safe from the viral storm swirling among us.

With most Everett residents venturing outside now wearing masks and practicing social distancing, it is difficult to reconcile this when viewing video of tens of thousands of people frolicking on the beach without masks and or social distancing in places like Daytona Beach, Florida.

Is this OK or is it not?

Are the frolickers casting their fate to the wind and the sun going to become infected or are they not? Are they going to return home and infect their loved ones, and then their loved ones go out and infect others?

The experts all agree – yes, this is going to happen.

The president does not agree.

He says we need to get open and to go back to work and that everything is just fine.

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The Summer of 2019 Gone Just Like That

We wait all winter for the spring and then for the summer only to find that in 8 weeks, the summer has come and gone just like that, like with the snap of a finger.

The summer of 2019 flew by.

The major mark this summer in the life and times of the city was about the biggest event in the city’s history.

The opening of the Encore Boston Harbor Casino and Hotel is unequalled as a summer event in this city.

It was the summer of the coming of the casino and hotel.

It was the summer when a city within the city was created, when 5200 employees were hired, when millions in new revenues began pouring into the city treasury.

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