The Weight of Summer

I remember a creek behind my grandfather’s house in Shropshire where the water was always cold enough to make your shins ache. My cousin, Leo, used to spend hours there, turning over flat grey stones to see what lived underneath. He didn’t care about the mud staining his knees or the fact that his shirt was soaked through by noon. There is a specific kind of freedom that only exists when you are small, a total surrender to the immediate sensation of the world. It isn’t about where you are going or what you need to achieve; it is simply about the temperature of the water against your skin and the chaotic, brilliant energy of being alive. We spend so much of our adult lives trying to curate our experiences, but perhaps the most honest parts of us are the ones that are still willing to get messy for no reason at all. When was the last time you let yourself be completely unburdened by the clock?

Fidan Nazim Qizi has captured this exact spirit in her beautiful image titled Playing in the Water. It is a vivid reminder of those days when the only thing that mattered was the splash. Does this scene bring a particular childhood memory back to the surface for you?