Once More, Upta Camp

Last weekend, we welcomed the start of the summer season, here in Maine. Along with our out-of-state visitors, we took to the road and headed upta camp, or up to the family homestead for our traditional gathering. With all the cool, wet days, the warmth and sun was very welcome. We did all the usual things, like cooking over the camp fire, changing into swim suits in the camp (Adam was the only brave one this year), groaning over jokes and painful puns and remembering other years when the wind was up and we all froze. We got the canoe out and went on lady slipper treasure hunts. We stuck marshmallows on sticks and ate many servings of Tim's pasta salad, the ingredients and flavors of which mimicked the classic Maine Italian sandwich, and wished for more servings of my Dad's excellent strawberry-rhubarb pie. We griped about the mosquitoes and black flies and our equally annoying state politics. Essentially, it's the same every year, these holidays spent on The Point, but that's exactly what we like about those oh so special days. They've become a tradition, a ritual, practiced and honored, cultivated and preserved. We all grow older, some of the faces change over the years, but the sense of place, the memories, those are what keeps us together. All of us know what it means to share this time with each other, in that place carved out by glaciers, pine drops under foot, the sound of water against the rocks. We have that feeling that we've all arrived somewhere special, the moment we reach the clearing. Not one of us would change a thing.