August is nearly here, and Greenwich is preparing to perform one of its most agreeable tricks: becoming quieter without becoming empty.
Many residents will leave for Maine, Nantucket, Wyoming, Europe or whichever distant place promises cooler nights and fewer obligations. Their photographs will soon arrive on our phones: harbors at sunset, mountains in morning mist, tables set beside water. We wish them safe travels and good weather. We also reserve a certain affection for those who remain.
Greenwich in August is Greenwich with its shoulders lowered. Traffic thins. A parking space on Greenwich Avenue ceases to be a rumor. Restaurant tables become available without negotiations worthy of the Congress of Vienna. Shopkeepers have time to talk. Neighbors stop rather than wave while moving. The town remains itself, but the volume has been turned down.
This quieter Greenwich deserves attention because speed can conceal abundance. We hurry past the beaches, parks, libraries, museums, ballfields, marinas, churches, shops and restaurants that others travel considerable distances to enjoy. We become so practiced at living here that we risk failing to notice where we live.
August corrects that oversight.
Walk Greenwich Point early, before the heat rises. Sit near the water without consulting a clock. Visit the Bruce Museum. Browse the shelves at the library. Take children to a playground. Buy lunch from a local business and eat it outside. Drive through backcountry roads with no destination beyond returning home. Attend the St. Roch’s Feast, where generations gather in Chickahominy for food, music, faith and the cheerful disorder of a proper neighborhood celebration.
Spend a morning in Old Greenwich, Cos Cob, Riverside, Glenville or Byram, communities whose identities are clearest when one is not rushing through them. Notice the storefronts that sponsor teams, donate to causes and recognize customers by name. August’s calm is an invitation to support the institutions that make Greenwich more than an address.
They deserve notice.
None of these activities requires an itinerary, special clothing or an airport security line. Their value lies in their proximity. They remind us that a good community is not merely a place from which one departs for vacation. It is a place one can rediscover when ordinary pressures temporarily recede.
American author Sam Keen wrote, “Deep summer is when laziness finds respectability.” The word “laziness” may trouble Greenwich, a town constitutionally suspicious of unproductive minutes. We prefer schedules, goals and measurable results. Yet rest is not a dereliction of duty. It is maintenance for the mind, the family and, sometimes, the soul.
There is civic value in slowing down. A hurried resident experiences a town as a series of obstacles: the traffic light, the delivery truck, the crowded sidewalk, the person taking too long at the counter. A rested resident sees people. Patience returns. Courtesy becomes less costly. The town feels kinder because its people have recovered enough attention to practice kindness.
The next issue, August 6, begins the Sentinel’s annual two-week August pause. The print edition will return Aug. 27. News will continue to be followed, and the community will not stop producing stories merely because the presses are quiet. The pause gives our staff time to reconsider what we do, improve what needs improvement and prepare for the demanding autumn ahead.
It also gives us an opportunity to say thank you. Local newspapers do not exist by natural law. They exist because readers subscribe, businesses advertise, organizations share information, sources answer calls and citizens believe their community deserves a record of itself. Greenwich has sustained the Sentinel, and that support has allowed us to serve New Canaan as well. The New Canaan Sentinel will mark its third anniversary in August.
So travel, if travel calls. Send photographs. Bring home stories. But those remaining should not regard themselves as having missed summer. They may have found its most civilized form.
August in Greenwich offers something rare: the chance to enjoy this town before September asks everyone to hurry again.
