CAPE COD SUMMER

 

Every year from the time we had kids, my sister Terry and I would get together for a week during the summer. Sometimes she came this way, more often I would take the kids and go to the camp owned by her husband's family on Saratoga Lake. I loved that week. Terry would insist that I needed a break, what with all the kids I had, and would command me to take it easy for the week. Since reaching adulthood I have never disobeyed that particular order and I would luxuriate in having no responsibilities, sleeping in and reading, reading, reading. Terry would commandeer the kids, who loved being with their cousins.

The group always divided into boys against girls and played endless tricks on each other.  There was the time the girls hid the boys' underwear in the freezer, the time they poured warm water on sleeping boys' hands to try to get them to wet the bed. The activity was endless and the adults didn't get involved unless it got physical.

Then in the summer of 1975, my parents offered to pay for a week's vacation for our families at South Yarmouth where Terry and her husband had vacationed for several summers. At the time our kids ranged from 15 to 5. Sam elected to stay home and work. I drove to Albany with the kids. We were to stay overnight at Terry's and head out first thing the next morning. With great predictability, one of my kids came down with an ear ache that night and we ended up in the emergency room with an irate doctor who treated us like we were idiots. We put up with him and got the needed penicillin.

Early the next morning, we headed to Cape Cod. My brother in law was to lead the way, I was to stay close behind. Fortunately for me, he had a boat tied on the top of his car or he would have left me at the starting gate. The kids in my car learned a few new words as I tried to keep up with the maniac ahead of me. I had no choice…I had no clue how to get to our destination and if I once lost sight of that car with the boat on top, we were cooked.

We had brought extra people along…a friend of Terry's, a young nun whom the kids called The Flying Nun and two extra girls, including Weedsport's own Sue Ryan. We ended up with a total of four adults to eleven kids.

The location and setup were wonderful.  There were two houses situated on a small cove. One of the houses was large and there three adults and nine kids were located. In the very small house was yours truly with my two youngest. I really dug that setup!

Terry organized the troops and assigned cooking and cleaning tasks. I got off scot-free. The water in the cove was warm and placid. The Flying Nun transported the kids around when they got bored, leaving us to bask in the sun. The group quickly divided into the usual boys versus girls and came up with tricks to do the other side in. One of the boys was spying on the girls when they were dressing, peering through a grill leading up to a bedroom. The girls realized what was happening and rewarded his efforts with a pail of cold water. And so it went for the week.

The last night at the Cape, we put on a show.  The Flying Nun, Terry and I sang songs we'd made up for the occasion, one being based on a rather ribald song I had learned in nurse's training that went, "Life at home is full of sorrow, Life at home is full of gloom, Father has an ..." Well, never mind. This is a family newspaper. After that, we really nailed the kids, putting our own words to Old Macdonald Had a Farm, giving each kid a verse, picking out a particular character trait in each child.  The kids in turn put on a couple of very funny skits.  It was my unbiased opinion that the adults won that talent contest hands down.

It was a vacation we've never forgotten. As it turned out, it was the last time the two families would vacation together during the summer, for we had arrived at the time when our kids would have summer jobs.  It was a great end to a fun tradition.