Lenore Skenazy, August 31

Dead summer walking.

No two ways about it — not with Labor Day prowling around, ready to pounce on the end of summer, skin it, pound it and throw it on the grill so it goes up in flames like a chicken breast marinated in motor oil.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but it is time to come to grips — if possible — with summer ending. For many of us, this means going through the five stages of grief first outlined by Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross … probably right around this time of year.

• Denial: "I no longer think of Labor Day as the 'end of summer' but rather that it marks the time when I am that much closer to next spring," a champion denier, publicist Irene Maslowski, said. "That way I can look forward to a new season."

Just not the one filled with phlegm and wet socks.

• Anger: Abounds.

"Last summer there was this guy coming in for the last weekend," said a year-round resident of the Hamptons, a popular summer getaway destination for New Yorkers. "He was tailgating me — almost ran me and my kids off the road — and you could tell he was counting how many seconds he had left on his house rental, like, 'I must have fun before my share runs out.'"

This happens at the end of every summer, she said, and the result "is like road rage." Or, to paraphrase Kubler-Ross, the feeling could be summed up as, "Why is this end of summer thing happening to me?"

• Bargaining: Those facing unbearable grief, Kubler-Ross realized, often try to make deals with a higher power — something along the lines of, "Just let me live until my son's tattoo removal and I promise to be a better person."

While this particular tactic is less evident as an end-of-summer coping mechanism, a fashion designer, Jackie Rogers, admits to having tried this mantra: "If you promise that summer will never end, I promise never to go out in the sun again."

This helps — as does her trick of going to Palm Beach for the winter.

• Depression: "I saw a leaf fall, and it was like, 'Noooooo,'" the author of "Diary of a Mother: Parenting Stories and Other Stuff," Christine Hohlbaum, said.

The leaf … life … the plunge … it was all too much.

A while back, Hohlbaum bought herself a full-spectrum lamp to counter the effects of Seasonal Affective Disorder — SAD. She also got a "dawn simulator." "It's actually an alarm clock that slowly gets brighter and brighter," Hohlbaum said.

Which sounds great until you look out the window.

For her part, a special education teacher, Hedi Levine, says: "It's all just poignant. The last barbecue. The last conversation with this or that neighbor" at her summer home. "Finishing the ice cream that's in the freezer. Standing at the edge of the pool with the leaves floating in it … "

Okay, okay — we get it: Depressing.

• Acceptance: Usually involves a calendar.

"Last year," investment relations manager Janet Vasquez said, the approach of September was "really bad." But this summer, she said, "I've started planning my fall."

To that end, she's ordered tickets for some plays and made a date with a friend for dinner (a date they'd originally planned for April). "Now I'm also looking forward to going into stores — as opposed to people's backyards and driveways — to shop," she said.

How can we be sure she is on her way to true mental health? Said Vasquez, "I'm looking forward to wearing black again."

Okay. She's good to go. Let's hope we all get there, too.

In the meantime, happy (ha!) Labor Day.

Lenore Skenazy is a contributing editor at the New York Sun. To find out more about Lenore Skenazy (lenore@lenoretown.com), and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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