So this may take some time for me to type since I am in a similar predicament as I found myself in at the age of 13 with a broken left arm entering into summertime. Just like then, I absolutely hate it because I have already found myself staring at the ocean and unable to embrace it, watching water sports and wishing it was me. Sand castles beckon and swimming pools taunt me and the bright sun will not allow me to bask in its warmth, rather, it makes me hot and sticky and itching inside my plaster prison.
Since I cannot, write, play music, or ride for the time being, I am left with time on my hands and part of that is spent remembering how magical summer used to be for me. It was a time when my academic education ended and many different learning experiences awaited me. My fondest have to be my days in Elkton. During those summers I visited my great grandparents. I would fall asleep to the sounds of the breeze through the trees and the barges coming in from the Chesapeake Bay. We ate dinners of fresh shucked corn and crab and caught fireflies after dinner.
Beach bonfires next to the pier taught me how to make the best smores and how to kill chiggers.
Before bed, we would tend to the sunburn and sore throat from consuming too much river water that we had tried to ignore for the sake of more fun. During the day, we were forever on the water.
I got my Maryland boating license and my cousin Jeff would take me sailing. We almost never went with my Papa due to the fact that he would inevitably lose the wind in front of an oncoming freighter ship and we would narrowly escape death. My favorite Yacht club parties were held on an island with a pool and a small rideable train and endless soda.
Tubing, water skiing, and boat rides were things that never got tiring. Every Sunday we would drive into North East and attend St. Mary Anne's with the promise of ice cream down the street afterwards which was an excellent bribe.
My first taste of what love was happened in this same spot too. Chris Talley was a friend of my cousins and a year and a half older than me with a black Jeep Wrangler. All it took was a boat ride and him trying to playfully drown me in the Elk River and I was smitten. I think I would literally light up like a Christmas tree when he came over and soon he started coming over not to see my cousin John, but to see me. We would take long walks around and look at the old CJ7 in the barn down the dirt road. One particularly enchanted evening we took a walk at twilight down a forest laden path, fireflies twinkling, to the Turkey Point Lighthouse where I received my first highly romantic kiss. Then he turned around and started dating someone else and I was brokenhearted. He pretty much set the trend for the next decade. But we stayed in touch up until I graduated from college.
Summers now are much different. I have a man who kissed me and didn't give up on me to be with anyone else. My kids now consume my days instead of the beckoning waters, but they always call to me. Responsibilities have replaced that carefree teenage spirit but every now and again, when I close my eyes, I can recapture all the memories again, and smile.
