The first stab of love is like a sunset, a blaze of color - oranges, pearly pinks, vibrant purples.

Even when a girl is married she still never completely leaves her mother and father's home.

It is easy to forget now, how effervescent and free we all felt that summer.

Among her other talents were forgetting what she did not like and ignoring what she preferred not to see.

That is what I want to tell you about: the girls with their short skirts and bright eyes and big-city dreams. The girls of 1929.

But in that moment she realized how false most smiles were and what a tremendous waste of time.

It is easy to forget now, how effervescent and free we all felt that summer. Everything fades: the shimmer of gold over White Cove; the laughter in the night air; the lavender early morning light on the faces of skyscrapers, which had suddenly become so heroically tall. Every dawn seemed to promise fresh miracles, among other joys that are in short supply these days. And so I will try to tell you, while I still remember, how it was then, before everything changed-that final season of the era that roared.