Dear Bank of Prairie Village Community~
August, like life, is a constantly changing month. It is full of both “Firsts and Lasts.” Further, because August has a little bit of everything in it, you in turn can make August represent whatever you want.
As I mentioned before, the Romans had to change their old calendar because the dates kept slipping and the harvest and tax collection season became out of whack. Essentially, our current “New Roman” calendar fixes the seasons relatively accurately.
Historically, at least in the Midwest, School ended around Memorial Day and started back up the Tuesday after Labor Day. Most of us my age fixed our Summer Season around those dates.
At some point with the advent of school air conditioning – the schools in the Midwest started ending for the Summer resuming in the Middle of August. Today, it seems like the dates keep creeping in the wrong direction.
Summer today, like the Roman seems out of whack.
Around Prairie Village, you see the legendary Shawnee Mission East Cross Country starting their early morning runs about August 1st. Driving Ward Parkway (just to the East of the Plaza) you can glimpse the Pembroke football and soccer teams starting up their Fall Season practices.
This brings us back to the many August contradictions.
August, which was traditionally a very solid “Summer Month” – (and in Western Kansas, always seemed to produce the hottest days of the year) is now associated as being a “Back-to-School” month.
“Family Vacation Month” now seems to occur and conclude in July, with the first Week of August being used to prepare for “back to school.”
I’ve learned in business trying to get a deal done during the last three weeks of July, is like playing “Three Shell Monte.” Someone who needs to sign a document is always out of town.
By contrast, in the Northeast, schools have remained much more aligned with the Memorial Day to Labor Day school schedule. The Northeast families with summer houses in the Hamptons, The Cape, The Jersey Shore, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket simply refuse to change their generational time-honored August vacation routines.
Thus, like Kansas City, trying to get a deal done in August with a New York bank or investment banker is like trying to get a deal done in Kansas City the last three weeks of July. The whole thing gives me a headache. As I have said, August is a month of contradictions.
It can be labeled as the month of “Lasts” and the month of “Firsts.”
It seems odd to me many pools simply close or go to “school hours” because all the lifeguards are “back in school” – even as temperatures regularly exceed 95 degrees. Football games are now being played in August. Kids can be seen leaving school (often wearing what looks like pool attire) heading directly to the pool.
Traditional high school and college “summer romances” I now must assume end during the last days of July. I’ve wondered how the 60’s song, “See You in September” (which played incessantly at the College Bars every May) would sound with the title was “See you in August.”
Similarly, how would the song “Summer Loving” from the Movie Grease have played if the John Travolta and Oliva Newton John, ended their Romance while still in July.
All this being said, I have a gut feeling, the “First Day of School” is unlikely to reset to until after Labor Day. Oh, if things were simply logical again.
As I said, like life itself, the character of the month of August has permanently changed. It is now up to us to either embrace or resist the change.
Resisting is futile. Hence let’s embrace August as having the “last great days of the pool season, the “last great days of vacation”, the “last great days of lazy family time” and the “last days of great days of summer interns.”
Let’s also embrace August for starting the “First Days of School”, (and all the new classmates), the “First Days of Fall Sport Workouts” (and all the new teammates), and the “First College Football Games” (under Conference Realignment/NIL/Transfer Portal normality’s).
In short let’s embrace the great memories of the past few months as well as the great memories to be made in the coming next months.
Yours in August being both a contradiction of “memories and anticipation!”
Whatever the month or season ~ memories or anticipation, it means a great deal to be your Bank and Bankers.
~ Dan Bolen
