![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
It's just after seven, this Labor Day evening, the traditional last day of the New York State Fair and, for most area school kids, the end of summer vacation.
Having spent the day by myself, my thoughts drift back to other Labor Days, when the family was still intact, and my grandson and I would be the last ones out of the water at one of the state parks on Lake Ontario or Green Lakes or Oneida Shores.
A few of those years, Labor Day marked the end of a whole summer spent together. We'd leave the city by mid-morning, while my wife was resting for her upcoming night shift at the hospital, knowing that we'd have to be back by mid-afternoon to get her up, put her dinner together, and take her to work.
We had a regular routine of gathering up towels and swimsuits and beach toys, of making sandwiches and packing the cooler with drinks to go with our lunches and snacks. And then, off we'd go, looking forward to a day of sun and sand and the sound of the lake washing rhythmically against the shore.
The little boy didn't have a lot of friends, in those days, and his father wasn't much involved in his life either. So I guess, during those years, I was both his friend and surrogate parent.
And he was something special in my life, as well. Looking back, it was around that time that his grandmother had begun her slow drift away from the life that we had all shared as a family. And so, I think, he and I grew that much closer out of mutual need as well as a genuine liking and affection for each other.
Now, even those days are gone and no one makes even a pretense of acting like a family. There's just too much anger and bitterness and bad history left with those of us who are still around to remember how it had once been.
And so, alone with my thoughts, I know that on this day, and at this very hour, the marker buoys are being pulled in, their augers unscrewed from the sandy bottom of the lakes where they've been over the long summer. Also, that the lifeguard chairs have been turned on their sides and dragged from their stations to the places where they'll be stored for the coming winter.
I know too that I miss those times, those final days of summer that the little boy and I shared as we looked forward to the new things that we'd soon be doing together, confident that we would always be there for each other.
Anyway, kiddo, should you ever chance to read this, love you always and have a good night. I'll try to be at your mom's, a couple of mornings from now, when the bus picks you up for the first day of the coming school year.
And I'll try to be there, waiting at whatever distance I'm able to be, should you ever need anything. Just like always...
LPK
Dreamwidth
9.4.2017
Having spent the day by myself, my thoughts drift back to other Labor Days, when the family was still intact, and my grandson and I would be the last ones out of the water at one of the state parks on Lake Ontario or Green Lakes or Oneida Shores.
A few of those years, Labor Day marked the end of a whole summer spent together. We'd leave the city by mid-morning, while my wife was resting for her upcoming night shift at the hospital, knowing that we'd have to be back by mid-afternoon to get her up, put her dinner together, and take her to work.
We had a regular routine of gathering up towels and swimsuits and beach toys, of making sandwiches and packing the cooler with drinks to go with our lunches and snacks. And then, off we'd go, looking forward to a day of sun and sand and the sound of the lake washing rhythmically against the shore.
The little boy didn't have a lot of friends, in those days, and his father wasn't much involved in his life either. So I guess, during those years, I was both his friend and surrogate parent.
And he was something special in my life, as well. Looking back, it was around that time that his grandmother had begun her slow drift away from the life that we had all shared as a family. And so, I think, he and I grew that much closer out of mutual need as well as a genuine liking and affection for each other.
Now, even those days are gone and no one makes even a pretense of acting like a family. There's just too much anger and bitterness and bad history left with those of us who are still around to remember how it had once been.
And so, alone with my thoughts, I know that on this day, and at this very hour, the marker buoys are being pulled in, their augers unscrewed from the sandy bottom of the lakes where they've been over the long summer. Also, that the lifeguard chairs have been turned on their sides and dragged from their stations to the places where they'll be stored for the coming winter.
I know too that I miss those times, those final days of summer that the little boy and I shared as we looked forward to the new things that we'd soon be doing together, confident that we would always be there for each other.
Anyway, kiddo, should you ever chance to read this, love you always and have a good night. I'll try to be at your mom's, a couple of mornings from now, when the bus picks you up for the first day of the coming school year.
And I'll try to be there, waiting at whatever distance I'm able to be, should you ever need anything. Just like always...
LPK
Dreamwidth
9.4.2017
