Vacation memories

I’m on vacation this week yet being the committed columnist that I am, I wanted to make sure I didn’t forget you, my loyal Wednesday readers. I used to get really excited about summer vacations, summer in general really, but the truth is things change with time. These days I get a little melancholy when special occasions come like Christmas, Easter, Father’s Day and, yes, summer vacation. Anyone over 40 years of age already knows what I’m about to say, that special occasions stir up the ghosts of those who are departed and we wish were still with us. Oh, if only wishing made it so.

Memories are a bit like jagged rocks tucked neatly in a knapsack you carry on your back. You know they’re there yet you still can’t take them out to lighten the load. Worst still is when you forget they’re there and reach into the knapsack and one of those jagged edges, or memories, cuts you unexpectedly.

That can happen in a million ways: a song on the radio, the smell of a favorite muffin at a bakery you used to visit with someone special or, for me, seeing the big hedges that say “Cape Cod” after crossing the Bourne Bridge.

I’ve been going to the Cape since I was a teenager. I watched my now adult children splash in the warm bay water when they were still in diapers and celebrated many birthdays with pizza at the Gift Barn in Eastham. Trips to P-Town where you could never find parking and whale watches where you saw more people getting sick over the side of the boat than you spied actual whales. Mostly, though, Cape Cod represents my mom to me.

She loved it there, and with my sister at her side they explored every neat place the Cape could try to hide. There isn’t a restaurant where we ate that they hadn’t found first. My mom has been gone about 15 years now but I see her in so many ways. There is an old bench outside a gift shop that she sat on every time we were inside taking too long to pick out a trinket to buy. I see her still sitting on that bench. We loved it there. In fact, my sister adored those trips so much that when it came time to retire the Cape is exactly where she went.

I think one of the reasons people love going to Cape Cod, or similar places in Maine, New Hampshire and Rhode Island is because they don’t change much. So when a fiveyear-old grows up and has a five-year-old of their own they can say, “This is where my mom and dad used to buy me salt water taffy.” There’s something comforting about that, don’t you think?

My dad was never a big vacation guy; he preferred being at home with his dog and newspaper and cup of coffee sitting on the deck. We’d tease him about not wanting to go away, but the truth is we knew he was happy — and what more could you ask from time off from work? Not to say he never took us on a family vacation, there were plenty of camping trips when I was a wee lad. The Watervliet Arsenal would shut down for two weeks every summer and off we’d go with our old green army tent to places like Caroga and Canada Lake. I know camping isn’t for everybody, including me, but I think every child should experience it at least once. Relieving yourself in the pitch-dark at 3 a.m. in a rickety old community outhouse is an experience you never forget.

One of the funny things about vacations is you’ll drive four hours away, pick a spot on a huge beach and end up with someone who lives two blocks away back at home laying their blanket right near you. It happened to me just last year in Orleans, Massachusetts, as my son Jackson turned to me and said, “Is that my friend Luke?” Sure enough, there he was with the rest of his family literally twenty feet from us on Nauset Beach.

So this week I’m taking a quick trip over to the Cape to visit my sister, jump into the freezing cold ocean and stir up a few of those ghosts I mentioned earlier. It’s not a bad thing remembering the good times even if it does break your heart a little. I think that’s the admission price for having lived a full life, those memories that push and pull and leave you emotionally sore.

Even though I’m not here this week, I hope this column finds you well and I hope you get some time off yourself this summer. Just don’t forget three things — bring lots of money, always wear sunscreen and watch out for great whites and great memories. They’re both lurking just below the murky water in a place the lifeguards dare not go.