'Only God knows, and since He isn't talking, nobody knows'

From the biography of Alexander Gershenkron

"The Fly Swatter"

By: Nicholas Dawidoff

Well, I am back and it has been a beautiful summer, absolutely wonderful, especially considering that it was capped off by the 100th anniversary of Cup Match; one that by all accounts exceeded everyones' expectations, including my own.

And while we may bemoan or celebrate the fortunes of our respective teams, in reality, the anniversary classic made us all winners. Yes, a summer to remember, a summer for the ages.

Unfortunately, summer, while not officially over, certainly is quickly winding down. I've always been of the view that at least in Bermuda, summer unofficially ends with the last ball of Cup Match. The uprooting of the wickets late on Friday evening, symbolising an end that we pray would never come; yet it always does.

As a boy, summer seemed like it lasted forever, that it was gloriously endless and magical. Three and a half carefree months always felt at the age of six or seven like ten or even a thousand. Life was timeless then in the mind of a child.

Naturally, growing up at Spanish Point in the 1960s has left indelible memories and most of them are of boyhood summers in sublime concert with my friends and nature, which extended its warm embrace to us all.

The open doors of neighbours' houses, the extended kinship that offered to all of us first cousin status - even to those not related. This was the neighbourhood of my youth and nothing brought out the beauty of that lovely piece of Bermuda than summer.

We had it all, from Deep Bay, a favourite swimming and picnic area, until deemed too dangerous by the erosion of the towering cliffs, to Boss's Cove near the mouth of Mill Creek. It was there, much like a condemned man given a last minute reprieve, that I was rescued by Brendan (Pickles) Robinson, who finally figured out before the other boys in the neighbourhood present, that the barely six-year-old "Rolfie" who had just fallen off the dock could not swim and jumped in to rescue me, as I was about to go down for the third and likely, last time.

But for young boys like Gene Beach, The Moore brothers, Blaine Robinson - who was Pickles' brother and my closest childhood friend - Val and Gary Dill and countless others, there was literally, no place like home. The opportunities for fun and adventure were so plentiful in Spanish Point as to beggar belief, especially when the routine of school did not get in the way, as was the case between June and September.

Such sublime freedom always offered its just reward to the young and innocent. We even had our own cruise ship by the name of the Marula, a sleek, I guess cabin cruiser-cum-fishing boat that was legendary. Just to get a look at the boat on filled us with awe and a certain pride. After all, the Marula docked in our neighbourhood and that meant that it was just as much ours as it was the actual owners.

I can't count the number of times that some of us would run our home-made BMW's, otherwise known as go-karts, down that big hill just to get a glimpse of it and feeling a little let down if we arrived to find it gone. When the first Marula was lost to fire, we were not only astonished but a little saddened as well.

But the absolute high points of summer were the occasional weekend pilgrimages to Bluck's Point to picnic and swim. The deep azure waters there offered us an aquatic playground second to none, with multicoloured little fish nipping at our heels and parents from all over Bermuda and their children taking welcome refuge from the mundane tasks of their daily lives, all set in my mind's eye to the sound track of "Summertime".

The Bermudian family at play was a sight to behold then, more fun loving, more gracious, more caring and less crudely materialistic. The world without and Bermuda at large may have been in some ways a hostile place for us, for even by the mid-1960s, Bermuda was still a very racist environment; yet we had each other and that was a good feeling. And to a child, security is the most highly sought commodity of all. When summer ended, no one ever complained that they had not gotten their money's worth in our neighbourhood. The gods of summer never gypped us.

Now, like then, we turn our attentions to the pending arrival of autumn, of slightly bewildered schoolchildren in neatly pressed uniforms, of increased morning traffic on the roads, and a city virtually devoid of tourists. Did anyone say Christmas?

Yet the memories remain.