SEPTEMBER, OUR MOST OVERRATED MONTH (9/7/21)

I’m depressed.

It’s September and summer is officially over and all I have to show for it is my booster vaccine.

I know everyone pretends that they love September, but it’s a month that creeps me out.

It signals the end of everything that’s fun.

Forget the beach. The lifeguards are gone and the ocean is filled with hungry sharks.

It’s getting dark earlier every day.

Every September for the past 70 or so years I’ve had nightmares that I’m back at Lafayette High School and I’m failing geometry.

(I failed geometry three times and the highest mark I ever got was a 38, which the teacher said I cheated to get.)

Before Covid, September was the month when everyone went back to work.

Now everyone is confused.

Should they go back to de Blasio’s New York City and take a chance on their faces being slashed in the subway, or should they stay here in the Hamptons and work in their pajamas?

My grandmother used to say about September, in Italian, that it is a month when flowers, leaves and old people die.

Grandma was a barrel of laughs.

She kept her word and died in September many years ago.

As I said last year, I’m at that age where I misplace everything.

This year, somehow, I seem to have misplaced summer.

It was here a minute ago.

What happened? The days dwindled down to a precious few and as best as I can remember, Memorial Day was just a few hours ago.

Now Labor Day just ended the summer.

At my age I’m discovering my biggest enemy is not the clock, but the calendar.

Here is something that may help you get through the day:

An old man in Miami calls up his son in New York and says, “Listen, your mother and I are getting divorced. Forty-five years of misery is enough.”

“Dad, what are you talking about?” the son screams.

“We can’t stand the sight of each other any longer,” he says. “I’m sick of her face, and I’m sick of talking about this, so call your sister in Chicago and tell her,” and he hangs up.

Now the son is worried. So he calls his sister. She says, “Like hell they’re getting divorced!” and calls her father immediately. “You’re not getting divorced! Don’t do another thing, the two of us are flying to Miami tomorrow to talk about this. Until then, don’t call a lawyer, don’t file a paper, DO YOU HEAR ME?” and she hangs up.

The old man turns to his wife smiles, hugs her and says, “It worked. They’re coming for Rosh Hashanah and paying their own airfares.”

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