It’s that time of year again. Here are your 2024 summer assignments.
1. Write a letter and mail it. Get out of your car, go inside the post office, and ask to look at all the stamp options and buy one that suits the person to whom you are mailing the letter.
2. Take naps.
3. Look at the people you talk to, call them by name, and compliment them about something.
4. Do a crossword puzzle. Use Google if you need help with a clue. It’s not a crime (but I would never have said that to my mother, God rest her soul).
5. Make some skillet corn bread and eat it with those fresh veggies out of your garden. Put butter or mayonnaise on the cornbread (or both, as my dad liked to do, God rest his blocked arteries).
6. Get in your car and drive somewhere or nowhere. Leave at 9 a.m. Be home by 6 p.m. If you don’t have a license, drive your bike to the pool or to the park and feed the ducks.
7. Make homemade ice cream. Vanilla is best, but Butterfinger is a close second. Fresh peach is a decent option.
8. Call your best friend and talk on the phone for an hour.
9. Bathe a dog.
10. Mow someone else’s yard. For free.
11. If you stay in a hotel, before you leave put all the towels on the commode so the cleaner (who might be an older person like me) doesn’t have to bend over. Either way, it’s just a nice little gesture.
12. Be kind as often as you can, even if it’s just a smile you share.
13. Gift a newspaper subscription to someone who no longer lives in your community but likes to keep up with things back home.
14. Listen to an audiobook, any audiobook, if Meryl Streep is the narrator.
15. Re-read “To Kill a Mockingbird.” Then watch the movie.
16. Watch the movies “Nacho Libre” and “Bernie” and see why Jack Black is a treasure.
17. Take walks in the morning or the evening and look at things.
18. Hold a baby.
19. Visit an assisted living facility.
20. Buy some new crayons, a coloring book, and treat yourself to some cheap therapy.
If you want to share your experiences with me, send me a note suejanesullivan@gmail.com.
Snyder, Texas, native Sue Jane Sullivan is a retired schoolteacher whose thought-provoking commentary appears occasionally in several West Texas newspapers, including The Texas Spur and The Caprock Courier.
