"V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N," proclaims a certain oldie as it celebrates the happiness and fun of summertime and the relief that school and the daily grind of academics are gone for several months. "We're on vacation, having lots of fun; we're on vacation and the world is ours."
This is the time when I see ads on TV and in other media outlets, including Facebook, targeted toward those who have the time and the financial resources to travel for recreation. Since the outlet I use most often is Facebook, when I log into my account I often see Facebook ads calling on interested users with resources, to "make the Bahamas your vacation spot, " or to make other choice spots their vacation destinations.
Most especially during this time of year, when I log into Facebook, I many posts centering on travel, vacations and summer fun. Regularly, when I scroll through my homepage, I see posts and sometimes see photos, of users who have, are or will be traveling or engaging in other activities of summer fun. "Look what we did on our vacaction!" a user will post, "We just got back from our vacation," or "We well be going on vacation for a week or two weeks." (And by the way, it is NOT recommended, for safety reasons, for any user to announce their travel plans and destinations before their travels for this is an open invitation to robbers).
I see occasional photos of users who are proud of their physiques and of photos of themselves and their friends, clad in only bikinis. Breast cancer survivors are using this time to bravely appear in their swimwear and showing their surgical scars.
It is true that the Memorial Day is supposed to mark the unofficial beginning of summer even as its focus and meaning is remembering the sacrifiices of the war-dead and deceased loved ones in general. Yet it seems that things do have a way of quieting down for many of us even as they heat up for others and the official day of summer (June 20, almost a month later) has actually lagged behind the Memorial Day weekend 2012.
However, summer is not a blessing or a time of fun and happiness for all people. Summer, as we all know, is the interim of several months before the school year begins for students of any page, unless students go to "summer school" for various reasons. Summer is the time, therefore, when many children from low-income families and often with special needs, spend boring, lonely summers. Their families can't afford to send them to camp or to other summer programs and many children with special needs, especially if they have special needs like autism or other hidden challenges, will have no one to play with. This means LONG summers for many children and many parents.
During the school year, many children from poor families benefit from free lunches and often, that is the only source of nourishment and "real food" they are able to get. But when a school year ends for these children, they will not have this benefit during the summer months. Therefore, they can experience real and increased hunger over the summer months. We're told that area food pantires all over the US experience an increased need over the summer months for this reason.
Vacationing costs much money for those families and indivuals who are able to travel for recreation. For this reason and others, giving to so many congregations and nonprofit organizations drops as these $$$ are being poured into costly travel and lodging expenses for those who travel or engage in other summer activities. However, the needs served by these churches and charities do not go away or decrease during the summer months.
During the school year, Sunday School programs are normally active in congregations. However, many congregations change or decrease their Sunday School programs during the summer months. It's true that most offer brief Vacation Bible School programs for their local communities and that more affluent congregations may offer more opportunities for children whose families can afford such opportunities. For so many children, especially those from poor familes or who have special needs, summer is the time when they get very little "God time." Also, attendence to worship services tends to decline during the summer months, making things worse.
Vacationing and traveling for recreation enable many to "get away from it all." But summer is also the time when many, especially the low-income and many lonely people, experience even more loneliness and boredom because of the limited availability of others who travel for recreation or who enjoy other summer activities. The other day, I saw a Facebook post by a user who simply used the word, "BORED" over and over again. I have, even recently, often remarked about how boring summer can be because of the limited availability of people at this time of year.
No, I'm not putting down traveling and vacationing for recreation or engaging in other activities for summer fun. And by all means, I certainly encourage sending children to camps or other summer programs, and to have teens work summer jobs, if families are able to do these things. Summer activities or summer employment (for teens) will supplement the learning that goes on during the school year and keeps the summer months productive and not idle. Vacations, if you have the time and $$$ to take advantage of them, can certainly be refreshing, relaxing times to catch up with family and close friends and "get away for awhile" from the daily grind and pressures of life.
And summer is the time when typical students of all ages enjoy "taking off school" for awhile. Remember the song that proclaimed "School's Out!"? " Summer is the time when typical students of all ages are relieved at not having to deal with the demands of schoolwork and face teachers and peers. In some countiries like South Korea and Japan, students go to school all year long and students from their school systems turn out highly literate and very competitive in the job market! I think that a strong case can be made for all-year schooling (with occasional short off periods) but I will not go into that discussion here. A certain school district in my state has tried this model and are going back to the more tradional nine-months model with the three-months off.
I have just celebrated a birthday, almost a week ago. I have never liked that my birthday falls around a time when many people's focus is on vacations or on the Independence Day and its festivities. I have used my birthday, relentlessly, as a platform to promote my petition and now that Independence Day is here, I am using that as the platform to promote the petition as I remind people that "autism does not take a holiday." Just as we have "recovered" from the Memorial Day weekend, now another holiday is here. I know that Independence Day is a time that thrills many people in the US and is a major time of fun and celebration as the official birthday of the US, when this country became a nation and a democracy. Many of us enjoy exulting in being the "greatest country in the world," the fireworks, barbeques, the togetherness and other festivities. Many in the US, especially among the veterans and their families and active troops and their families, find this day and other patriotic holidays deeply meaningful as they focus on their sacrifices and what it all means to them and to their country. And many other patriots agree.
However, Independence Day and most other holidays, are not seen as unmixed blessings and times of celebration by all. This holds true especially especially for those with autism and its associated sensory differences; theAnd se keep the holidays from being a time of fun and celebration. When the senses are overwhelmed by noisy family gatherings, the different tastes of tradional foods, and other festivities, holidays are an issue. Fireworks that so many love at this time of the year, are simply overwhelming to the senses of so many people, children and adults, with autism of any form. And if you are facing illness or the loss of a loved one at this time, the holiday will not be an unmixed celebration.
Today, we in in the US are hearing it proclaimed that we are celebrating the birthday of "the greatest country in the world." And when we see how many outside the US come into the US in pursuit of better lives than what they knew in their homelands, a strong case can be made for this. But then people emigrate to other counties in the free world, not only the US. One country cannot take in all the people who may want to seetle there and that is why immigation needs to be regulated but I will not get into that discussion here or into all the controversies of how this should be done. But is the US really "the greatest country in the world"? I wonder about that when we have the highest crime rate and especially violent crime, of any country in the free world. I wonder that, when we are the only developed country where millions of our citizens are without access to any health care. I wonder that when students graduating from our schools lag behind graduating students in other developed countires, in reading, writing, science and math. And with the ever-increasing inequality among rich and poor where corporate greed and political corruption ensures that the rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer, I wonder if the US is "the greatest country in the world." If you are a person and a US citizen who, because of poverty and lack of social support or connections, have not been exposed to opportunties where you can "soar" to reach your potential, will you feel that your country is the "greatest country in the world"? I doubt it.
In some ways, especially if you are one who is unable to get out and who cannot afford vacations or other summer activities, summer will seem like winter in reverse where you must stay indoors if you are blessed with the relief of air-conditioning and don't have to work outdoors. And this is the time for storms and fires and heat-related power outages, such as are happening in many US states. "I'm ready for the Fall to get here!" I have said and now sometime think. Yet, the other day, I saw a Facebook page declaring, "It is six months before Christmas." Gulp! Need we be reminded?
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