nothing ever happens.

Early in July, two or three days into her summer holidays, my daughter told me she was bored.

It was the first time in her life that she had made such a pronouncement, accompanied by a sigh and an air of world-weariness that was both amusing and mildly alarming – she is, after all, just barely seven – but it was not the last.

Not even close.

(I remember having that feeling as a child: I’m not sure I was bored, exactly, but being untethered from the daily routine of the school schedule was, no matter how welcome, sometimes a little deflating. So I should have been sympathetic – and in fact I was, for the first while, but then – predictably – my tolerance waned.)

But I am here to tell you, friends, that despite my daughter’s pre-pre-adolescent murmurs of discontent, this summer has been nothing approaching boring.

In the past week alone, there were four cakes baked, three birthday celebrations, two actual birthdays, and one quickened-heartbeat-inducing top secret photo shoot (about which I will gladly tell you more when it is published, in October).

We have begun a holiday-Monday family tradition involving this place.

We have discovered magical hidden parts of our city.

I have fallen in love with dresses and cold brew.

We have purchased airplane tickets and are counting down days.

My garden has grown wilder.

And the other night, in the midst of this delightful, demanding, madcap and anything-but-boring stretch of weeks, the light shifted slightly and a breeze came through the screen door, bringing the kind of cool air that signals imminent change, making me want to catch my absent husband and my perfect summer and my no-longer-babies in my arms and tell them:

I love you.

I love you.

I love you.