Camps

One summer, my aunt and uncle, Barbara and John, went to somewhere exotic, like Bermuda, instead of summering as usual in Conway at Hillacres Farm. They put their two children, Debby and John, into the sister and brother camps, Waukeela and Waunalancet, on Crystal Lake. Even though my sister was there, I was lost without Debby for the summer, and at the same time jealous that she'd gone to camp without me. Still, I knew by a child's keen sense, that she was miserable at camp, and so was Johnny. We four cousins belonged on the farm, together, reading, washing dishes, making daisy chains, picking blueberries and wild strawberries, swimming, playing in the barn, on the swing that our grandfather had hung from the rafters three stories above our heads. There were two notched boards for seats; one for one person and one wider for two. The wider one was the most comfortable for one, we reached our arms out wide for the ropes. There were many things that could be done on that swing. One cousin could twist another, twist the rope all the way to the barn roof, and then the one in the swing would spin unbelievable dizzying for minutes, and then not be able to walk. One cousin could be pushed on the swing; pumping ourselves could never get up to the height that our feet might, if we were brave, touch the barn window over the big wide rolling wooden barn door. Debby and I sat together on the swing and sang, for hours. One of our favorite songs was a translation into French that we had made of Che Sera Sera. We liked songs with repetitive lyrics that we could sing in the car as well, to the despair of the grownups in the front seat. A good one was "He wore black denim trousers and motorcycle boots, a black leather jacket with an eagle on the back." We were not little girls at this point, but budding teens, fascinated with French and with bad boys. Another game the four of us played in the barn was Train in India. The back of the barn had a rolling door too, like the front, but much smaller. Some sumac grew next to that door, and we could sit on the door sill, dangle our feet over the side and pretend we were on a train in India. When we were much smaller, our grandfather parked his station wagon in the barn. He would stop at the house first, to unload whatever purchases he'd come home with, and then sometimes we would be given the magical treat of riding down to the barn in the station wagon. If we wanted to swing, sometimes we'd have to ask that the car be moved.

The summer Debby and Johnny were at camp, Mr. Harper, the man who planted lollipops in the sand at the South Conway Club beach, became Santa Claus for a Christmas in August party in the barn for Debby's birthday. There were lots of girls from Waukeela with Debby, and it felt wrong. Debby and I were, gratefully, to have many more summers to on the top of the mountain.