June summers

I first thought about this memory about a month ago, while I was at an amusement park, with swimming-pools and slides.

I suddenly remembered the intense feeling of the beginning of the summer break, right after school ended before the first half of June each year.
I think it was around the time or just before I got my first scooter motorcycle, so I was probably 13 or 14 years old, 15 top. Late '90, early 2000s.

I remember going to the communal swimming-pool with a few friends and classmates from school. It was an activity organised by the school but since the dates were after the school year ended, just a few of us attended.
We took a booked bus in the morning to the "big" city where the outside pool was and we came back in the afternoon to our smaller town, with a voluntary teacher supervising us.
The water was still pretty chill in the morning but we were eager to get inside, even if we get cold.
We packed a few sandwiches for lunch and maybe we spent a few Italian lire on a snack or an ice-cream from the swimming-pool’s bar.

I recall feeling a lot of freedom and potential in my life while getting around in my swimming shorts, slippers and swim cap, with no worries at all.
Three whole months without school, September was basically next year and holiday homeworks were a distant nuisance, quickly pushed away from anyone's mind.

I never went anywhere with my family since my parents had to work and didn't have any money to spare on travelling at the time, so we spent our summer at home.
The local church organised 4 weeks of activities and day trips, but they usually started only at the end of June.
Before that there was just free time, whole days from the quiet mornings to the late evenings, since there was no school the next day.

My school-free June days started by rising without an alarm and spending the morning at home, maybe by playing a bit of video-games on the family desktop computer or while looking for something interesting enough around the house.
My grandma or my mother would make us (my brother and I) lunch and then I usually went to one of my friends' home, a few kilometres away, to spend the afternoon.

Hanging out with one or more friends, we spent our time talking about our interests, video-games, internet stuff and girls.
Sometimes we played ping pong or played ball in the courtyard, some other times we went somewhere with our bike... but we mostly hang out at home, maybe with an a ice-cream in the afternoon straight from the freezer. One lucky friend had a pool table!

Around 6:00-6:30 PM I had to get back to have dinner, my father used to eat early before going to work in the evening for the night shift.
The evening were usually uneventful and I spent them at home, watching a movie on satellite TV (basically essential on the mountains), reading or - once or twice a week - by surfing the Internet on a 56K connection with our family PC¹.
Crickets sang outside in the dark. Every now and then the lone car passed by. It was always pretty quiet.

#memories