Intermediate Composition: Essay of Place Written 16 Oct 1997 Revised 30 Jan 2013 (Version 2) The Lake Cabin It doesnt

t seem like years have passed since I have been there, yet there is this plot of land I used to know that still holds a few truck loads of my childhood memories. It holds, in its architectural grasp, many relaxed yesterdays that I hope to repeat at my own cabin one day. My favorite place of retreat was my uncle Rogers lake cabin. To me, being on a lake is the best pastime created the most important end goal to have in life. There are outreaching trees, vast blue bodies of water, and roads that curve around hills, dip into valleys, and pull up alongside beaches. There are little creeks left undiscovered, sand castles still to be erected, and fish to be caught. Almost every memory out there was a great one. My uncle has now modernized the plot more because he has retired from the Air Force. Although he changed the cabins appearance, the memories are the same. The area behind his garage was home to a few crazy kids long ago. Wed run around getting incredibly bit up digging for night crawlers to fish with and the boy cousins structuring their treehouse far up into the sky accommodating to their bodies by adding a hose for their bathroom needs. The three stall garage that sits opposite to the cabin across the road contains his prize possessions of a tiny red MG convertible and a 1952 Chevy truck (that is now in my fathers hands). Walking tippy-toe on the hot blacktop road back to the cabin, any of us from the past can close our eyes and visualize his first cabin. The worn red wood holding two small bedrooms, his bar, a kitchen and bath, and the den-like area with a fireplace. The green bedroom had two single bunk beds set up in the rafters with a ladder between that could be pulled up, so we wouldnt fall the long way down. Many nights I stayed up there because I was the oldest. I would lie listening to the hail and rain hitting the roof only three feet from my head. The small kitchen was the cite to hamburgers, sloppy-joes, and hot dogs as has the bathroom to many statements like: How did the sand get there? or Mom, I dont wanna put on sunscreen (because all the other cousins were supposedly halfway to the middle of the lake)! and Who gets to sleep on the bunks THIS time? The last question was typically from the little kids not realizing thirteen is bigger than two. And around the corner lead to Rogers bar. From behind it, one could stare straight at the lake. We would pretend to be bartenders making up dangerous shots of vermouth and whiskey for imaginary customers. All this fun while the lake Lake Melissa sat there inviting us in. It begged us to jump off the dock & splash our least favorite siblings or cousins. As one walked on the deck, underneath was Charlies home. Charlie was the friendliest chipmunk. As we ate outside on sunny summer days hed peek out, and my uncle would feed him his entree of peanuts. The few rows of trees that stood before us in our journey to the water were most likely Charlies happy hunting grounds, but we also played many games of frisbee there. Once on the hot sand, the sun would greet us with a penetrating warmth. In the city, people freak out about this warmth sweating buckets but this is the lake. The warmth is expected and required and on the itinerary. I can see us running quickly to the waters edge and can remember the exact locations of all the sand castles I built. If I close my eyes, I can picture my earliest days on the beach with my siblings and cousins. My sister Alisa in her little blue bikini that never quite hid her baby belly, me in my ragged pink one, and both of us coated in SPF smelling like five different types of coconuts.

If I glance back at the beginning of the 2x4s, which make the dock, I see our childhood bonfires of smores and red cheeks and giggles. I hear all the fights we endured the big kids versus the little kids, for example and our so cool comebacks and put-downs. Above that childhood chaos is the pole. Our uncle had placed a pole near the shore and put a bright orange windsock on top, so we could find our way home across the lake after much fishing or tubing. I can stil recall when Robin climbed monkey-like up it to replace an old windsock, and how we cheered her on and took many pictures. Jumping up onto the dock, careful not to get splinters, one could stroll down to the end of the 2x4s. In staring into the misty seaweeded water, I can spot minnows and small sunnies that Jed used to catch without bait. I saved two lives at that spot when I was younger. (Neither Robin or Jed were born with much balance apparently.) Peering over to other docks and boats, I turn right and remember the sunnie I caught at the landing next door. I was so excited and wanted to show our dad that I hastily ran over to show him but at the same time, I accidentally caught it in Alisas damp hair. She cried and my mom tried not to laugh. If I were to dive off the dock into the cool water that comes up to my neck, Id try to calculate the placement of the twenty-foot drop off. Way back then, I wouldve latched onto a tube and strategically climbed onto it (trying hard not to look too foolish). Id remind myself, too, to not to go too far out or stay out on it too long and fall asleep many of my sunburns have some from this situation before. When we were young, and comfortably in the water, wed scream to everyone that the water is warm once you get used to it, and our mom would grunt in opposition. Jed would run out and belly flop after rubbing sunscreen in large circles on his protruding stomach and back. Later he would look alien-like with bright white and deep red skin in weird designs. If time were to change while standing on that beach, the small cozy shack would be replaced with Rogers design of an A-shaped home of great heighth. It encloses the many comforts of a true home; he has added a larger everything. The bar is more his style with Air Force memorabilia plastered on walls and in frames. He has used his old antique wood burning stove that once upon a time was used for drying extremely wet clothes, socks especially. Its major pipe leads all the way to the top of the thirty foot ceiling; its hugged by enormous angular windows that encompass the whole wall of the lakeside of the cabin. The area inside is mostly open except for a staircase that steers one up to a balcony of sorts three rooms are situated up there: a bath and two bedrooms. If one walks out of any of them, he/she would be in full view of the den, the lake peeping through the windows, and/or the kitchen. The cabin and lakes, in general, have a tranquility to them unmastered, as far as I am concerned, by anywhere else. A person can have a blast joking around with friends & family as a bonfire dies out, or take them down to a creek where the lakes meet and have them lose their jelly shoes. Or one can recline on sticky plastic chairs down on the beach and hope to catch a few rays to show off later in town during the week. The lakes are quiet serene gesture that opens its arms of sunshine and sand and invite you to the most peaceful heaven on earth. And still every time I think about wandering out to lakes country, to relax and take in nature, my mind ventures back to those scenes and conversations of cousins and suncreen and smores.