Childhood Revisited

My kids reminded me this evening it is our last night together until early August. They are leaving to go join my folks at my childhood safe place, a lake in the northern Midwest. This year I have too much going on to join them for part of it. Actually, because of Europe, I just don’t have the vacation time. But, …

My kids get to live my childhood for a bit, the childhood as far back as I can remember.

The Girlie will collect colorful, unique rocks harvested from the Big Lake near by and lovingly house them in empty Quaker Oatmeal containers with a paper towel between each layer. She will collect Queen Anne’s lace, dandelions, and young ferns from the shadow in the woods. She’ll put them in a large Mason jar and present them to my mom with that beaming, prideful smile.

The Boy will spend hours rowing around in the cool, clear water. I taught him to fish a few years ago. Maybe this is the year he will develop the nerve to touch the fish and remove it from the hook on his own. He is an explorer now. And the lake will provide countless hours of solitary entertainment.

They’ll eat outside on the picnic table in the shade and have fresh white corn and bbq’d steaks that my dad expertly prepares. My mom will make her pea and peanut salad. There will be lemonade, cheap beer, and even cheaper wine. They will eat in their slightly damp swim suits and sit on their drying towels. They will play board games at night with the windows wide open and the bugs bouncing off the screens. Through the glass in the front door, they’ll watch a spider make a nearly perfect web just underneath the overhang by the porch light. They’ll walk up to the small grocery store for candy and random errands from my folks. If they catch the right week, there will be renters with other new friends staying in the cottages near by. Bonfires. ‘Smores. Ghost stories. Jokes. Romance. Crushes. Silence.

The lake water holds my sanity. It is my safe place. Maybe it is the way it regularly captures a calm in the late evening to go with a mango sunset. Or, the way on a windy day the water matches the clouds in the sky and treats me to a marching rhythm of white caps that play a beat on the shore like a metronome. It is where I go at night when I’m far away and can’t sleep.

I’m going to miss my Lake. Not too much, though, because my kids will bring back two weeks worth of stories. Not having them be there would be worse because home and family need to continue on even if I can’t physically be there this year. There is a wonderful sense of balance knowing that some traditions are kept safe.

It comforts me to know that my Lake is still alive for my kids. They will bring fresh breath and a stronger heart home to me when they return.