CREEK ROAD GANG
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Thoughts from the Editor:
July 2010
copyright 2010
Somehow, when I was looking the other way, we slid into summer. I swear when I was a kid, it was easier to notice. For one thing, we didn’t have air conditioning, so the inside temperature gave us a big clue. When it got hot in the house, we put screens in the windows and kept them open for the next few months. If it still got too hot, my mother would give us cold drinks when we came in from playing, and then we’d go back out again. My father had put up a great swing set for us, burying jumbo-sized cans of cement into which he’d anchored its legs. We’d hit the swings, pumping with our legs to go higher and higher, leaning into it and leaning back, feeling the breeze we made fanning us as we built up a sweat. Sometimes my father would tell us to get our bathing suits on and he’d spray us with the garden hose as we ran squealing and laughing across the grass in the backyard, dripping ourselves cool. And one year, my parents got us a shallow rectangular wading pool that had a wooden triangular seat at each corner. We’d splash in the pool, but the most exciting thing about it was that one summer when a frog we named Thumper took up residence in the pool.
Better even than the garden hose and the wading pool were our frequent daytrips to nearby beaches. When I was very little, before the Salk vaccine, we swam in a lake in July, but in August we went to the ocean, because, I was told, the danger of polio increased faster in smaller bodies of water. After the vaccine, the pattern remained – lakes in July, ocean in August. Those excursions to the beach were full of fun. I’d stay in the water for hours, then dig in the sand and play with other kids. At the lake we most often went to, there were lots of trees for shade and even a small playground, but what we loved best was the water. One summer day when I was six, almost seven, my parents packed us into the car, along with our cousins and the boy next door, as well as our shovels, pails, changes of clothing, towels, and the wonderful picnic lunch my mother made. When we arrived at the lake and began piling out of the car, each of us helping to carry something, a snooty woman looked scornfully at the six children and said to my eight-months pregnant mother, “You are disgraceful!”
When we went to the ocean, I could search for shells and pretty stones and smooth sea glass. I used to scour the beach carefully, hoping also to discover the wreckage of some sunken ship which might conveniently wash ashore, or at least some pretty gold coins from the olden days of pirates. But the best thing was going into the cold, salty water, and the up and down feeling of floating over waves. I would stay in the water longer than my brothers, and finally run out, chilled through, but ready for lunch. I’d sit on an edge of our blanket, my feet coated with sand, eating my bologna sandwich and drinking lemonade, and dripping with the juice of the peaches and plums Mum always packed.
Oh, summer was definitely different then!
Or maybe not.
Maybe it’s still here all around us. Maybe we can still give ourselves and others those blessed moments of being fully present and open to the excitement of what the day will bring.
Better even than the garden hose and the wading pool were our frequent daytrips to nearby beaches. When I was very little, before the Salk vaccine, we swam in a lake in July, but in August we went to the ocean, because, I was told, the danger of polio increased faster in smaller bodies of water. After the vaccine, the pattern remained – lakes in July, ocean in August. Those excursions to the beach were full of fun. I’d stay in the water for hours, then dig in the sand and play with other kids. At the lake we most often went to, there were lots of trees for shade and even a small playground, but what we loved best was the water. One summer day when I was six, almost seven, my parents packed us into the car, along with our cousins and the boy next door, as well as our shovels, pails, changes of clothing, towels, and the wonderful picnic lunch my mother made. When we arrived at the lake and began piling out of the car, each of us helping to carry something, a snooty woman looked scornfully at the six children and said to my eight-months pregnant mother, “You are disgraceful!”
When we went to the ocean, I could search for shells and pretty stones and smooth sea glass. I used to scour the beach carefully, hoping also to discover the wreckage of some sunken ship which might conveniently wash ashore, or at least some pretty gold coins from the olden days of pirates. But the best thing was going into the cold, salty water, and the up and down feeling of floating over waves. I would stay in the water longer than my brothers, and finally run out, chilled through, but ready for lunch. I’d sit on an edge of our blanket, my feet coated with sand, eating my bologna sandwich and drinking lemonade, and dripping with the juice of the peaches and plums Mum always packed.
Oh, summer was definitely different then!
Or maybe not.
Maybe it’s still here all around us. Maybe we can still give ourselves and others those blessed moments of being fully present and open to the excitement of what the day will bring.
~ Kate Lydon
