Another Back Entry: Lake Martin

7/7/2010 Wow, this chair’s still here.  It’s speckled with mildew, and a few of its plastic chords are dangling loose by my left knee. They open a slot just big enough to wedge my heels in, so I prop my knees up, rest my book on them, and stare across the satiny green water.  My mom used to read in this chair for hours, shifting it across the beach to follow the sun across the sky.

On a Friday afternoon a bit over a year ago, I got a jarring email from my dad.  He didn’t know how else to notify all four of us at once that our lake house had burned down.  I immediately called home, and my mom was in hysterics.  She couldn’t say much, other than wailing out a slow itemization of her precious artifacts.  Dolls that we had treasured as little girls, baby clothes that she had sewn for us and was saving for our kids, her wedding dress, family photos, Dad’s record collection.  Nothing reimbursable, nothing of particularly high monetary value.  It didn’t occur to me to think about the ski boat until I arrived at the house and saw the charred trailer with bits of melted fiberglass draped over it.

This is the second time I’ve been to the lake in the past three years.  Two years ago, on what turned out to be my last opportunity, I didn’t come because I wanted to “experience the 4^th of July in DC.”  Last May, my sister, younger brother, and I came down the day after we received my father’s shocking email.  Mom stumbled through the blackened doorframe in tears, arms outstretched, when we pulled into the driveway.  We helped her dig through the ashes like hounds searching for bones we’d hidden, pulling up soaked and charred remnants of her precious handmade dresses.

My parents have spent the better part of the past year winning against the insurance company, redesigning, and rebuilding.  The frame is basically the same, but they took this as an opportunity to improve and update.  Textured shades have replaced the sailboat curtains in my brothers’ old bedroom, and the sectioned red couch that we used to rearrange into forts has been downsized.  On the wall behind that couch, the serial watercolors of the twelve months have been replaced by black and white prints of the four seasons.  On the opposite wall hangs a charred green sundress with ice cream cones smocked onto the front.  It wouldn’t have fit my sister’s newborn for at least another couple of years anyway.  Mom, a realtor whose time has been liberated somewhat by the slow housing market, has been sewing furiously and lovingly, to ensure that baby Hannah is well-outfitted.

The lake’s water is still clear and green, which is why they came here in the first place.  I spent all of yesterday floating and chatting with my best friend Sarah, who spent countless hours in the house that burned down. Mom and Dad traded the propane stove for electric, changed the finish on the cabinetry, raised the ceilings, and installed crown moulding.  My sister’s and my dolls were mostly lost, and Dad’s records are gone forever. Mom’s fried eggs still taste amazing, but she still won’t eat breakfast before noon.

But this chair:  this chair, I have just now realized, is still here.  Dad gave it to Mom when he was still in the furniture business, and in twenty years, it has never left this beach.

Back entry: con vida despues de la buena noche

6/19/2010:  The ads on the bus stops in Columbia Heights always amuse me.  I passed one yesterday with three Heineken bottles lined up against a dark background beside the words “una buena noche se recuerda todo el dia.”  Nothing sells beer like paying homage to the hangover.  When I saw that ad, I was standing on a packed bus, trying to make myself as unobtrusive as possible while carrying three heavy bags (with which I was delusionally planning on hitch-hiking a few days later).  A woman had already lifted her toddler onto her lap, offering her seat to my smallest backpack, and I straddled a gym duffel full of ropes, cams, slings, nuts, and carabiners.  At the end of the day, I hauled all that stuff to Union Station and caught the Camden Line to Baltimore.  Making good use of an idle hour to practice tying climbing anchors, I frightened the train-riding public with my 21-foot length of cord noosed into a loop.

Fast forward to 24 hours and una buena noche later, when I awoke to the jolt of wheels touching down and felt my head tilting forward as the plane slowed down.  I looked out the window and…MOUNTAINS…felt almost alive again.  Now it’s a crisp 70 degrees with abundant sunshine in Spokane, and I’m on my way to see my grandparents.  And, con mis disculpas a Heinekin, la noche ya se me olvidó.