"In this sticky web that we're all in, behaving decently is no small task." -- Novelist Stacey D'Erasmo

Saturday, July 17, 2021

Summer Vacation

      I remember when we were kids, my mom and dad would pile us into the car and we'd ride up to a lake in New Hampshire or Vermont for a month's vacation. It was a long trip, before the Interstate went that far north, but it was a lot of fun.

     My dad didn't stay the whole time. He had to go back to work. But we drank in every moment -- swimming in the lake, jumping off the raft, running through the woods, and picking leeches off ourselves at the end of the day. Somehow those leeches, aka blood-suckers, didn't bother us at the time. Kids don't care.

     Later on it was summer jobs. I worked at an amusement park, a beach club, and one summer as a camp counselor.

     By the time I had kids, time and activities were more structured. We went to visit Nana and Grandpa every summer, usually for a week. But otherwise the kids were taking swimming and diving lessons, or tennis lessons, and entering local tournaments. They later went on to become a lifeguard, an assistant tennis pro, and then play in college.

     So what are your fond memories of summer vacation? I can guarantee, they were always good, weren't they?

     I am taking a summer vacation from blogging. No tennis. But probably some golf, maybe some swimming, and a little bit of traveling. I'll see you again after Labor Day. Have a good rest-of-the-summer!

25 comments:

Anonymous said...

Be safe and enjoy

ApacheDug said...

I don't know how we did it (and our parents didn't kill us) but we took big summer trips every year in a station wagon packed with 6 kids, our cat, food, clothes, games, comic books, etc! We always traveled south to Virginia Beach, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida. I miss seeing all those signs for peaches, pecan pie & fireworks :)
Have a good rest-of-summer Tom :^)

Arkansas Patti said...

We usually had staycations since we either lived on a lake in Ohio or in Key West. Plenty to do both places.
Swimming and life saving courses in the summer on the lake or riding my pony on the beach in the keys. Wouldn't trade either.

Linda Myers said...

That will be a good summer break for you!

Celia said...

Have a lovely vacay.

DJan said...

When we lived in California we went on vacations every summer, usually south to LA to visit relatives, or Sequoia National Park, or something similar. Good memories! :-)

Miss Merry said...

I only remember one vacation. We drove from Ohio to Michigan to watch my dad crew in a boat race. We stayed at a Howard Johnson's. That is about all I remember about it.

We didn't ever take our children on vacation either. My jobs never offered more than a week or two weeks vacation and I usually took it one day at a time for daycare issues, sick children or later, college visits with teenagers.

Kathy @ SMART Living 365.com said...

Hi Tom! Most summers my parents would pile us kids in the car (and later a big camper on a pickup) and drive us back to Colorado and Nebraska where they grew up and other family lived. It was always fun to play with the cousins and go to rodeos and ride horses and I remember it well. Enjoy your summer--I'll miss your words of wisdom--but we'll be here when you get back! ~Kathy

Wisewebwoman said...

Enjoy your summer Tom. My childhood summers were spent on a small island off the coast of West Cork in Ireland. Us kids took off our shoes and didn't put them back on till the end of summer. Free to ramble, no traffic, 3 swimsuits each we swam so much. Halcyon days.

XO
WWW

Carol Cassara said...

We also took family vacations...to the Adirondacks or to Brooklyn to my mom's family. Oh those hot summer days in the city!

Olga said...

Yes, many fond memories of summer vacations -- usually involving time at a lake and get togethers with extended family, lots of cousins.
Enjoy the break (but come back, don't forget!).

Rebecca Olkowski said...

We had 5 kids in our house so it was mainly road trips and camping in our camper. Grandparents and other relatives were out of state but they occasionally met us in Vegas at the Sahara or Frontier. We swam while the adults hung out in the Casino.

Meryl Baer said...

My sister and i spent most of the summer with my grandparents at their bungalow in the Catskill Mountains, until I wanted to stay home, hang out with my friends and had a series of summer jobs, working at a day camp among them.

priscilla said...

My dad always too us camping..loved it!

Kay said...

Have a wonderful summer vacation, Tom. We didn't do much of anything during our summers because our parents worked. When I was older, I was working in the pineapple cannery. Our kids on the other hand enjoyed their summers, I'm sure. We tried to take them on trips whenever we could.

Jennifer (UnfoldAndBegin) said...

We had great summer vacations that usually had some educational aspects to them. We went to Gettysburg or did a side trip to Lexington and Concord when we stayed in Boston. We went to New Orleans one year and dad made us take a side trip to Vicksburg. But the 2nd best vacation each year was in the pool in our backyard.

Laurie Stone said...

Enjoy the rest of your summer, Tom!

Karen said...

My maternal grandparents had a summer place on Lake Ontario. As Neil Young says, all my memories are there. My first memory is laying in a cot with a net over it watching the leaves flutter on the trembling aspen at their camp.

Mage said...

I really liked the "FIRST CAR" essay. I hope you don't mind if I used it yesterday.

Rian said...

My favorite summers were spent on my Uncle's farm in Mississippi. My parents would drop me off for 2 weeks and for a city kid, sleeping in a feather beds, riding horses, bringing in cows, swimming in the creek, looking for arrowheads, and helping plant crops was the best! Outside of that, we did go to Florida several summers and once up to Gatlinburg, Tenn. to the Smokey Mountains National park.

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Snowbrush said...

For me, summers were mostly a respite from school, which I hated. My father only got a week's vacation a year, and my family couldn't afford to go far, but I cherish my memories of the places we did go.

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Country Girl said...

We lived on a farm and hardly ever left except for a 2 week vacation every summer to Maine to stay in a cottage by a lake. We swam, tried to water ski, went fishing with our Pop Pop, hung out with friends and had a great time. We drove from Jersey to Maine. 5 kids in a station wagon. We'd leave in the wee hours of the morning so the kids would be waking up around the tunnel in NY. Besides that we'd occasionally go to the beach with cousins. No worries or cares when you are a kid! Those were the days!

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