With the arrival of the school, it means the Summer of John #6 has come to an end. (This is where I would put one of those frowny-faced emojis, if I knew how to do that.)

Having a “real” job in education, free time tends to dramatically decrease when the school bell starts ringing. But as with all previous SOJs, this was one was a blast. Here are a few of the statistics:

** Played 378 holes on golf courses in five different states. My goal was six states, but somehow I didn’t put a tee in the ground in Texas. My bad.

** By my loose account, I traveled more than 3,700 miles, never going more than four days without a trip out of town.

** Saw a minor league baseball game for the first time in decades. I was stunned how things have changed since the days of the Shreveport Captains.

** I stood in awe on an empty high school football field in rural Mississippi and could almost hear echoes from almost 40 years ago.

Some of these I will write about soon and some I can promise you don’t want to read about, so I won’t subject you to them.

** But my favorite time — and something I will write about — was the day I spent in Assumption Parish. For years, I have wanted to re-trace the footsteps of my mother, who grew up in Napoleonville. I have so many memories of visiting now-deceased family members there. Figuratively, I went back in time. Literally, I was touched by personal emotions I never knew I had. I don’t know how much you’ll want to read about it, but I can’t wait to write about it. The problem? I worry that I can’t do it justice.

If ever I doubted the power of Facebook, the Summer Of John is proof. I can’t tell you how many times people asked me about it, where I was going next, or comment on a previous post. I know it’s just a take-off on a famous Seinfeld line, but the Summer Of John is truly is all about taking advantage of the time that is afforded you in the summer.

Time to get back to work.

You can’t always judge a steak by its cover.

I have vowed to meet these couple of dear friends that I have — we will call them Thing 1 and Thing 2, which is appropriate — somewhere soon. We actually did it this weekend. We always talk — actually text — about these get-togethers that we will never do. Children and jobs and things — we know that it probably won’t happen. So we talk and say, “Here’s another thing we won’t ever do.”

Except this past weekend, we actually did it. Thing 1 met me in the Little Rock Marriott lobby. “We are doing this thing that we said we wouldn’t do!,” he said. Guys have GOT to love on another to meet in Little Rock — not offense to Little Rock, which actually is awesome. You just don’t think of it as Utopia. But it is, if a couple of your friends are there.

Thirty minutes later, Thing 2 rolled in. It was on.

The details of my roughly 24 hours in LR was a wonderful time for us. You can imagine it would have been the same for you, if you were with old friends. You are mature and old enough to know it probably won’t go perfectly, but still…it’ll be perfect.

Here’s an example.

We always fantasize about eating ”crisscross,” a steak with grill marks on it and all. It’s the “Bonanza Steak House” in us. Saturday night, we did. We ate crisscross together. Sort of.

See the picture above? Doesn’t that look good? It does, except it wasn’t.

Thing 1 and Thing 2 ate theirs to the bone. So happy for them. But the waitress saw I was struggling. I WANTED to enjoy it. Except it was terrible. Imagine trying to chew up a shingle. Must have come from a rogue cow.

Long story, but they didn’t charge me for my steak and I got full on my tater. Sometimes, life doesn’t work out as you’d hoped. BUT, Thing 1 and Thing 2 were there. That’s all that really mattered. I’d tasted the good life, and that’s what’s important.

(Besides, I knew the next day we were scheduled to eat catfish. Why worry?)

-30-