San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Here’s why June rates as our best month
Some people think the month of May is the best time of the year in this part of the world. Summer is just around the corner, and there are still wildflowers on the hills. Others favor October, with its warm days and a touch of autumn in the air.
But I vote for June, just now. It’s a month of new beginnings. School is out. It’s a month of graduations, weddings, celebrations. We have Pride this month and Juneteenth, too. June is like Christmas and New Year’s with better weather.
I was reminded of it just the other day when some friends and I made a trip to Dixon, not far from Sacramento, to toast Bill Fairfield, an old shipmate who was just awarded a Congressional Gold Medal for his service in the World War II merchant marine.
While we were thinking of the old days, the town was thinking of the new. There were signs everywhere: Congratulations Class of 2022. “I am are so proud of our seniors,” wrote Dixon High School Principal Stephanie Marquez, in her year-end message.
Graduation had been held the day before, right at the beginning of June. The principal had urged the graduates to paint the town green, the school colors, and maybe they did.
It was a day to remember. A night, too, probably, with those bittersweet graduation parties.
High school best friends promised to always keep in touch, sweethearts wrote “love forever” in the yearbook. Everybody remembers the day they graduated, the cap and gown, the ceremony of it, pomp and circumstance, even in high school. You are not a kid anymore.
Some old family friend was sure to shake your hand, offer their most sincere look. “Congratulations. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you.” Most young people wince a bit when they hear that. What do old people know about anything?
But it is true. Graduation is a new beginning, and June is the first month of the rest of their lives. For some there’s a summer abroad, or a gap year, or a summer job as a lifeguard or a tour guide.
But for most of the rest, Europe is out. Even a road trip is tough when you are young and broke and June can be a bit of grind. It’s tough, even when you are 18 and can run like the wind, or are 21, older but wiser. You are never sure what’s ahead.
The first challenge is to test the waters. Everybody’s hiring these days, so they say, but as it turns out, looking for that first real job is tougher than that tough final exam.
You offer a painfully thin resume to gatekeepers at Human Resources. The first lesson comes quickly: They don’t think you’re human and they don’t think you’re a resource.
The first rejection for a smart young man or woman is something else to remember. I still remember a hopeful interview I had at a famous company in an important and grand office. “You look very promising,” the genial woman said, leaning forward and smiling. “We don’t have any openings just now, but we expect some soon. We’ll call you.”
Of course, they never did. I brooded for years, and when that firm was swallowed up in a hostile merger, I was glad. Take that.
However, being disappointed in June is better than losing out later in the summer or in dreary November.
You can always start over again in June. Even the weather is on your side. You can always go to the beach; the serious fog starts in July on the coast and combines with the serious heat in the rest of California.
But not in June, not usually. The sun sets as far north as it ever does on June 21, the longest day of the year.
Some of the highest and lowest tides come in June. I spent a midweek June afternoon and evening in Sausalito just the other day, and noticed three sea lions basking in the sun atop the ruins of what is left of an old lumber schooner. The piece favored by the sea lions only appears at very low tide, and then is covered up again when the tide turns.
The high tide brought schools of tiny silvery fish that caught the afternoon light.
At dusk, I went for a walk on the dock, just after sunset. The wind had died and Richardson’s Bay was as calm as a pond in the park. It took a long time for darkness to come. Twilight lasts a very long time in June.
We had an election the other day. Lots of serious stuff. I voted for June.