At Bantam Lake

Mikala’s personal Bantam ritual – lying in the hammock still damp from a swim, re-reading the dog-eared copy of Brat Farrar that has been on the bookshelf since before she was born, maybe dozing off if all goes well – was enlivened this year by the arrival of a fierce thunderstorm that woke her up, shook the house, and sent a solid sheet of rain off the gutterless roof between her and the view for a good twenty minutes. Fortunately she had been supplied with a cozy fleece blanket, and half an hour later the sun was shining again as if nothing had happened.

Most Bantam activities go without saying: playing "Jump or Dive" off the float, locating the submerged Big Rock by triangulating the trees on the shore, cutthroat croquet and Parcheesi, corn on the cob every night. This year's highlights also included an archery set that George and Kay had bought at a charity auction; chamber music on the porch with Gail; the kids’ mad dash down the hill, off the dock, and into the kayaks to retrieve the escaped floaty noodles -- only to relinquish them to a family who happened by in a motorboat; and Simon’s realization that he couldn’t bear to put a fishhook through the plump, wriggling earthworm he had dug up and somehow bonded with (and everyone else’s secret relief that the baloney he substituted proved unappetizing to the fish, so that he didn’t have to face the sad reality that fish wriggle too).

We made our usual trip to the local thrift shop where Josie (who has heard enough Middle School horror stories to thoroughly dread what awaits her this fall) took one look at a glittery strapless dress and declared: “If I could wear that, I would be willing to go to a 6th grade dance.” (We didn't buy the strapless number, but we couldn't deny her the sundress that matched her hair.)

We discovered that both kids have inherited the Keeler passion for charades -- though Josie's first turn was a bit traumatic: she was all set to act out a book with a four-word title, but when she indicated that the first word was a little one, Emmett promptly shouted out “A Wrinkle in Time!” Josie was so indignant at being denied the pleasure of acting out the rest of the title, we had to give her another one. Another great moment had Uncle George, hale and spry but definitely in his seventies and six foot four to boot, scrambling down onto the floor, curling up in a napping pose, then pointing enthusiastically at the surface he was sleeping on… Hmmm… It’s a movie… two words… sounds like… The Mattress? Oh, of course: “The Matrix.” (What would the Wachowski brothers make of this comparison?)

And so, even though some things at Bantam have changed -- there's a shower now, and bedside lamps in the attic, and the peanut butter is no longer stored in the piano -- it's still pretty easy for our kids to share the experience Mikala and her sisters had here as a child... and all their cousins, and Emmett and his brothers, and their dad too. (Though at this point it's not clear if Simon will ever be able to trace his first fish on butcher paper and tack its silhouette up on the wall with everyone else's.)

That's really what this whole whirlwind tour of our childhood summer vacation spots is all about. I don't think we ever spend enough time at each one for our kids to imprint on them the way we did, but it's good to give them a taste, anyway. And to revisit these touchstone scenes ourselves: seeing how much we've grown & changed since the last time we sat in the hammock reading Brat Farrar (or the first time, for that matter), and hitting the reset button that restores the core piece of ourselves we built there over all those years.