Camp Journal

Journaling On The Dock With True Laptop

We just couldn’t part with the trinkets that now simply collect dust on the windowsills of the lakeside cabin that once belonged to my in-laws.  Spring cleaning, someone in the family had dusted the figurines and faced them toward the pond overlooking the distant twin mountains. The plumb little girl, big eyes cast upward, her loyal canine sitting beside her a witness to all our campfires, lobster feeds and botched boat launches.   Everything about this place reminded us of Grammy and Grampy.  Years past, the gray enameled wood stove produced artfully crafted pies baked in the woodstove and strong black coffee perked on the stove top to be served between rounds of horseshoes.  The yard between our property and my husband’s aunt and uncle’s property was the perfect pit, the length in accordance to horseshoe rules.  It has been so many years since we have worried about flying horseshoes connecting with little heads.  The little heads, many of whom are now parents themselves have long ago buried their grandparents.  It is now the next generation who are making memories at camp.  My husband has been coming here each summer of his life since he was a toddler.  Lots of memories have been made here and there are many more family stories and tall tales to create.

          It is nearly 6 pm and the wind has suddenly picked up simultaneously with the activity on the pond.  Two men are slowly crawling their way in the water across the pond, the wind creating choppy waves.  The quiet couple across the pond has just boarded their boat heading the bow to open waters and next door a boat docks trailing a tube heavy with kids.  Sounds like a very social place.  People wave, yet we do not know each other.  What I really come here for is seclusion, at the risk of sounding cliché, “to commune with nature.”  There are many points on the pond in which rotating 360 degrees yields a similar beautiful view, thick mounds of green forest as far as you can see.  It is in the quiet that I see clearly and vividly.  Lying on a beach pink with granite nuggets, the dog day cicadas sound like jingling change left loose in a pocket.  Glacial erratics bigger than a big SUV dot the shoreline.  Not alone, but happy.