"summertime and the livin' is easy. fish are jumpin' and the cotton is high."

"Summertime and the livin' is easy. Fish are jumpin' and the cotton is high." That is my favorite line from Billie Holiday's "Summertime" and every time I am home in the deep south during my favorite month of June, I hear this line play over and over again in my head and it takes me to another place in time. When I look at these photos on the island with our palm leaves I hear this melody. No one else will fully understand it but me.

Livin' use to be easy in the summertime with not a care in the world. I now live vicariously through my cousin Estelle and when I'm with her and when I'm back home, I feel like a young girl again and all my cares are set free. We were up to "trouble" when these photos were taken, and I remember laughing so loud and hard as my heart was beating running down the boardwalk into the sizzling sand dragging our palms leaves in hand. Estelle was behind me capturing the moment and trying to not loose it. I'll always try my best to never loose the child in me and the adventure and the naiveness that a child can hold. Life is too precious to take it so seriously. Though I am back to reality and far from home, I dream about it and have these photos and memories to hold on to. And it makes me smile, and I can see the fish jumpin' and my how high the cotton has grown back home in the deep south...