Every once in a while during our decade-plus sojourn in the Upper Midwest, I’d wonder where all the fireflies were. Because it always seemed that I rarely saw them. I don’t know if that’s peculiar to the Twin Cities area, or Minnesota, or the Upper Midwest more generally, but it just seemed like there were very few fireflies (or, as we called them as kids, lightning bugs). I’d assume that I was imagining that phenomenon (or lack of one, I suppose), except that on moving back to Pennsylvania I was struck once again by how we can watch the fireflies dance every summer evening. They’re everywhere and always something of a mystery and...

It’s summer. Which means, among other things, that school is out. Summer means different things to different people, of course. For some it’s about family vacation, for others it’s time at the beach or lake, for others – especially in the Northern Hemisphere – it means warm weather and longer days. But given that I have spent the overwhelming bulk of my life as a student, teacher, and/or parent of school-aged kids, summer has almost always been defined primarily as the time between the end of one school year and the beginning of another. This summer – prompted in part, I’m sure, by my impending transition – rather than take a...