So, working with children allows me a glimpse into the lives of modern-day families with small children. I hear about play dates and trips to the park and outings full of agendas. It has made me wonder...but where do they run?
When I was growing up, we would spend many summer weeks at my grandparents' cottage on Foster's Point on the New Meadows River. The adults, I am sure, were driven from the suburbs by the summer heat. For me, the allure was the freedom!
The cottage was a part of Rock Haven Colony, a dirt road dotted with summer cottages nestled between grassy fields, pine groves and berry thatches. Now, when I say "cottages", I mean just that...the cottage was a rudimentary structure with no insulation and smelled of mothballs, must and salt air. We had electricity, but no running water. Bathroom breaks included a short walk to the outhouse (ours was a 1-seater; the neighboring cottage had a 2-seater...fancy! Although, I'm not sure what the draw was about chatting with a family member while you both pooped.).
While at the cottage, kids had the freedom to roam. We ran through fields and (gasp!) over neighboring lawns and nobody batted an eyelash. We would stop at the natural spring for a drink and pick sweet raspberries or seedy blackberries when we got hungry. We were beckoned home by the ringing of a cowbell. At some point over the course of our stay, Nana would send me down to the shore at low tide with a tin bucket, promising me that whatever clams I could dig up, she would steam for me for my next meal.
The colony was just that: a group of families who summered together on the river. Each night, the adults would gather at one of the cottages for "Club", which would entail several cocktails, snacks and lots of laughter. The kids would gather for a game of flashlight tag or simply lie back on the hill and gaze at the night sky.
When my grandmother passed away, we sold the cottage with heavy hearts. It was old and dilapidated and needed so much work, we just didn't have the resources to put into it.
I had been having a lot of dreams about the cottage, so David and I took a drive down to West Bath one summer day a few years ago, just to rekindle some of my old memories. We were able to visit with some of my distant cousins who still have a cottage along the water and happened to be there the day we went. We parked our car at their place and walked the rest of the way to my old stomping grounds. So much had changed, yet some things were the same!
As we neared the top of the hill, I was immediately swept up in the smell...it was so familiar! Salt, pine, earth, seaweed...I'm not even sure of all it was, but it was the same.
But, wow! The feeling was sooooo different! Everywhere I looked, there were fences. Stockade fences between every cottage, marking off individual lots and securing privacy (I guess). Gone were the fields and groves and berry patches, replaced with homes. Ranches and two-story houses, it looked more like a suburb than a colony. Our cottage was still standing, but had been updated (much needed) and winterized. A well and septic system had been installed and the outhouse still stood, but is now being used as a shed.
I still have dreams about the cottage, the way I remember it as a child. So much has changed, which is simply part of life, I know. But it saddens me that this place I remember as open and free and community-driven has obviously turned into "mine".
And it makes me wonder...but, where do the kids run?
