009: welcome back
a brief interlude while we adjust to the wildly different world of 2025
ella.
hihi! this week i’m here with a very special guest to welcome you to 2025. she’s a radiant, pulsing beam of energy and one of my very dearest friends. and oh yeah. her name is summer. how perfect is that???
Summer.
Hi team, my name is Summer! I am beyond excited to be a guest writer on Summer of Love. Ella, my beautiful fake gf (long story), asked me if I wanted to be a part of this week's edition while I was at work dying of boredom, and that news put me through the roof. I am currently sitting on my bed in our staff house in the middle of nowhere (Clarence River, if you are curious), trying to figure out how to do this. It's my first time writing for a blog/substack, so bear with me.
ALL ABOUT SUMMER:
I’m 19 but 20 this year (aahhhh!)
I love: The outdoors, animals, skiing, other people <3
I’m the biggest extrovert EVER.
Going into 2nd year @ the University of Canterbury studying Media and Communications and Spanish!
Working in the middle of nowhere for summer.
ella.
in the first couple weeks of this year, we’ve been reflecting on a year left behind and looking forward to (somewhat tentatively) everything 2025 promises. living in our own flats for the first time. working and studying. grocery shopping (bane of my existence) and keeping our rooms clean without our mums reminding us. becoming more deeply who we are now because we owe it to our weird sixteen year old selves to be the people we’ve always dreamed of.
Summer.
A fun thing I started doing as we hit 2025 was asking my friends and family to label what they wanted the year to look like in one word. (Let us know what that word would be for you!!!)
The word I chose for 2025 is Joy. All I want this year is laughter, smiles, driving with the windows down, girls nights out, confidence and being unapologetically me. This is my first official year of adulthood, and I want to go into it with joy and happiness because although there are many more responsibilities now, you can still find joy in the small things in life.
ella.
do you see why i LOVE summer so much? here i am freaking out about responsibility, and this beautiful, radiant human is like, ‘yeah, but there’s still joy!’
one of the best things i got from last year was friendships with people like bram and summer who are my sunshine-in-the storm. there’s so much to be scared of but people who exude love and light are sooooooo grounding. keep them close.
anyway! on the first of jan, summer asked me to pick one word to describe my year. i picked rad; rad as in radical. complete, entire, holistic; doing everything with my whole being. also rad as in teenage mutant ninja turtles; doing AWESOME STUFF in general, different stuff… that’s vague but i did kayak off a 32ft waterfall in the first week of jan so. that sets the tone, i think.
Summer.
For inspo, here are some other answers I received.
Wet (?)
Flourish
Adventure
Fun
Whimsical (we LOVE it.)
Better
Reclamation
Slay
Tidy
INS AND OUTS (because we <3 following trends.)
B U M P I N’ T H A T 0 0 9
Summer.
Freaking out on the Interstate - Briston Maroney
Tan lines
Whittakers Peanut Butter Chocolate
All that and more (sailboat) - rainbow kitten surprise
Daisy Jones and the Six - Book and TV Show
Facetimes
Sun to Me - Zach Bryan
Hacking out (or horse riding if you dont know what that means)
Sticky Buns
ella.
what a devastating turn of events, rachel chinouriri
fresh pink hair!
mixed metal jewellery (don’t make me pick. ever.)
red (tv), taylor swift (THE albummmmmmm.)
jim cain, bill callahan
marshmallow fluff fudge
there it goes, maisie peters
NISSAN ALTIMA, doechii
we love you so much and will see you next weekkkkkkkkkk! hope your summers are going well (and tell us if they aren’t. we’ll publish all your summer woes like letters to the editor and personally defend you. summer of love fan club is under bram and ella protection. we’re all ride-or-dies now.)
if u rearrange summer of love u get love of summer THANK YOU SUMMER much love + thanks for writing the coolest most hope replenishing guest edish while i picked my brain up off the floor!!! love ya xxxx