There's never a vacation from one-upsmanship
By Beth Teitell
Wednesday, September 14, 2005

As John Roberts faces the Senate Judiciary Committee, he should look on the bright side. He isn't the only one being grilled. The rest of us are in the hot seat, too, and we face a question that can be even harder to finesse than one's position on Roe v. Wade.

Namely: ``How was your summer?''

It sounds so benign, doesn't it? And it's not like the answer really determines anything, like your qualifications for Supreme Court seat. And yet, if your summer wasn't perfect, in a J. Crew-Pottery Barn-Smith & Hawken kind of way - answering truthfully can be a real downer.

Particularly if you're the victim of summer one-upsmanship, like I was. One moment you can be walking around feeling like you got enough beach, lobster and relaxation to write a decent ``what I did on my summer vacation'' essay, and the next, you're calling the Cape to see if you can rent a place for this weekend, just to squeeze in more frivolity. ``Price is no object.''

Yesterday afternoon I ran into a woman I hadn't seen in months. I should have veered away, as she was in the produce section, picking up some basil for what would probably be a delicious heirloom tomato, fresh mozzarella and basil salad. ``Hi,'' I said, plunging the knife in my own heart, ``How was your summer?''

She got this blissful look on her face. ``It was amazing,'' she said, gazing into the distance, mentally recalling sunset views I probably couldn't even dream of. What kind of fool was I, thinking my summer was acceptable when it wasn't ``amazing''?

To calm myself, I popped the question to a colleague I knew had had an OK summer. ``For me it's not a simple question,'' he said. ``Summer's such a long period. What if you had a good week in June but the rest of it stunk?''

He paused. ``Why am I dwelling on the fact that my Fourth of July weekend sucked?'' he asked rhetorically, ``because June was good.'' I goaded him a bit: ``What about August?''

``June was good,'' he repeated, as if to fortify himself.

You can always make stuff up, of course, but that can lead to trouble. ``The problem is if you've had a tepid summer and you start to mix things you've seen on TV into your narration,'' a friend noted. ``Such as, `Well, I went to a friend's cookout and we had a great time, and then Gabby and Carlos lost all their money after he got arrested and they had a Port-a-Potty in their back yard and Paul murdered Mrs. Huber.' ''

My advice? Lay low for a few weeks, and brace yourself for the next round of interrogation: ``How were your holidays?''