I don't think they'd make the song if it was purely about the place in Olympia, because of the other meaning of Indian Summer. But I'm sure that's part of it. It's about country-side enjoyment and playing around in late summer, at least. it's less about actual events than fantasy hopes, something kids do a lot when they really enjoyed being someplace and want to go back. "We'll come back for Indian Summer and go our separate ways." That separate ways is what I think a lot of people ignore when they listen to it. People like it for the simple, strong pastoral imagery, and the adorable idea of having a picnic in the cemetery, croquet, abandoned farms, picking fruit, etc. I think the bit about norms and the abandoned farm is kind of a nostalgia or longing for simple, small scale agrarianism, and overall the song celebrates that kind of thing as being plain fun. As far as deeper meaning goes, it can go in a purely twee direction like morbot suggests or it could go in a more twisted direction like 1fish does. Knowing beat happening it's probably meant kind of on that line between tongue-in-cheek creepiness/irony and real sincere longing for these peaceful love days, deliberately ambiguous, like some of the lines. Do you really think calvin thinks "we will never change, no matter what they say"?
I don't think they'd make the song if it was purely about the place in Olympia, because of the other meaning of Indian Summer. But I'm sure that's part of it. It's about country-side enjoyment and playing around in late summer, at least. it's less about actual events than fantasy hopes, something kids do a lot when they really enjoyed being someplace and want to go back. "We'll come back for Indian Summer and go our separate ways." That separate ways is what I think a lot of people ignore when they listen to it. People like it for the simple, strong pastoral imagery, and the adorable idea of having a picnic in the cemetery, croquet, abandoned farms, picking fruit, etc. I think the bit about norms and the abandoned farm is kind of a nostalgia or longing for simple, small scale agrarianism, and overall the song celebrates that kind of thing as being plain fun. As far as deeper meaning goes, it can go in a purely twee direction like morbot suggests or it could go in a more twisted direction like 1fish does. Knowing beat happening it's probably meant kind of on that line between tongue-in-cheek creepiness/irony and real sincere longing for these peaceful love days, deliberately ambiguous, like some of the lines. Do you really think calvin thinks "we will never change, no matter what they say"?