Family Vacations
When Peter graduated from art school he did what he’d promised himself; take the money given to him from his family and use it for a cross-country tour of the United States. He loaded up his VW Beetle and went west.
Years later, when we were married and I was expecting Michael, I knew that who ever this child would turn out to be, he or she would be taken by Peter, one summer, repeating this trip.
In the years that led up to Michael’s 16th birthday, Michael and Peter would take the third week of July, come here to camp in Ricketts Glen State Park, and attend the Benton, PA rodeo. It’s a real rodeo and people come from many places to watch the young men and women trying to stay on the wild horses.
During that week I would happily stay at home. I need some solitude to function well so this was like a retreat week for me. That week became a tradition. Part of this tradition was when the two came home, they moaned and pleaded to move here permanently. I always said the same thing:
“Well, you’re there for a vacation. Of course it seems like a wonderful place to live.” End of discussion until the next July. Michael was only five when Peter first took him “upstate” for a camping vacation. Michael seemed like a baby to me and I thought he was too young for camping. (Where that thought came from I cannot say. I was never a “helicopter mother” and I wanted, very much, for my husband and son to be important to each other.)
However, the pair were away for either six or seven weeks when they took the cross-country trip and I stayed at home, working as a counselor and NOT feeling sorry for myself. Lovely solitude with time to think and read. However, when they got back I was struck by this thought: I am tired of these separate vacations. Why can’t I learn to go camping and then we could have fun together, all three of us? I said this and P and M looked straight at me with their pairs of blue eyes. They have a funny childlike look in their eyes when I speak like this. Innocent you might say.
“Well, where should we go?” P asked.
“Next summer, I want to go camping with you two and see the place you love.”
This is how, while riding with my darling son Michael, I entered and exited the Lehigh Tunnel and my life was changed forever.
lgmwriting 