Cottage
Where I ramble about my feelings on the family cottage being put up for sale:
When official word came down at the beginning of the summer that my grandmother was putting the cottage up for sale, the first emotion that I felt was actually anger. I (and the other grandkids) were a little angry that our mothers didn't want to keep the cottage, which does, officially, belong to them. Oh we know the reasons why; my mother lives just that much further away now and it takes over 3 hours for her to get there. It's also not a place she can take her monster dogs to. Aunt #3 has a beautiful, fully-equipped farm (with pond, swimming pool, tennis courts and horses) as well as places in Bermuda and the Barbados, so she doesn't have a need to go up to the cottage. Aunt #1 lives 20 minutes away from Aunt #3's farm, so goes there. Aunt #2 goes to friends' places in Collingwood for golfing and such, so also doesn't feel need to go to cottage. So done deal as far as they're concerned.
But my brother, cousins and I were a little angry over the fact that the idea that we could keep it and continue to maintain it was just completely by-passed. It's like despite the fact that we are grown up, we're not grown up enough to maintain the cottage. We kinda resented that. We liked the idea of being able to go up and have some friends up now and then, something that we couldn't really do much of in the past because it was our grandparents' cottage and Grandma loves it up there; she goes up at the beginning of the summer and doesn't come down until the end of it. Grandad, on the other hand... never much of a fan.
But after some thinking, I could see the aunts' point. Of the grandkids, I'm the only one with a stable enough job to pay the property taxes and utilities on the cottage. Cousins #2 and 3 have good jobs now, but cousin #2 just got married and is saving for a house, while cousin #3's good job is down in NYC, so she's based down there. Cousin #1 is trying to find a job, whilst my brother and cousin #4 are both still in school. So yeah, I can't afford to maintain the cottage all on my own. Even though I'd really like to be able to take my kids up there.
Cousin #4 hit upon the idea of all us grandkids going up there to spend a last weekend with our grandparents. We all thought it was a grand idea and all of us (with the exception of cousin #3 who was working on her work visa and so couldn't leave the US again so soon after leaving to come up for her sister's wedding) went up, with significant others in tow. We had an absolute blast. Being so much older than my cousins, I haven't really had the opportunity to hang out with them for an extended period of time since they all kinda grew up (the exception being cousin #1 who is more like a younger brother to me), so I was really happy to have the time to hang out with them for an entire weekend.
While we were there, we were having so much fun that it didn't occur to me to be sad that this was most likely going to be the last time we'd ever be at the cottage. We went for boat rides (some canoe, some were for fishing), we went into Huntsville, some went for a run into Baysville, there were midnight swims, we made a game of heading off our grandparents' propensity for bickering, we had huge, sit down dinners together, we sat in the gazebo till late at night, smoking and drinking and talking and listening to tunes. And as I didn't bring my children, well, it was a wonderful little vacation.
So no, I wasn't sad while I was up there. But today, I actually saw the MLS listing for the cottage, and this, more than anything, has made me sad. The cottage was bought in the spring 1981, just before I turned eleven. From that summer until I went away to university, I spent every summer, ALL summer at the cottage. My mother took all summer off from work and she, my brother and I, spent all summer there with my grandparents. Three years later, at the age of two, cousin #1 joined us for the entire summer. You can see why we think of him more as a younger brother than a cousin. And on the weekends, or for various weeks here and there, a parade of other aunts, uncles, cousins 2,3 and 4 and my father would also join us. It's a small, shallow lake, so the water was always warm, there was a beach to dig in, boats to go fishing in, a creek to go catch minnows, frogs and turtles in, towns to go into when it rained, and the highlight of each and every week, Bingo in Baysville on Wednesday evenings. Of course I remember being bored there sometimes, but it wasn't as often as you'd think, since I always had lots and lots of books to read.
So now I'm sad thinking back on those days. They've been gone for awhile of course, but the cottage was still there for us to go back to whenever we could. But soon it won't be. I won't be able to take my kids up there and that also makes me sad. And of course, I'm faced with the extremely sad realization that my grandparents are just getting too old to be up there for long stretches by themselves. It's not fun to finally have to think of my grandparents as 'old', even though they're both still pretty spry for being in their late 80s.
I wish we could keep it. I wish the reality didn't point out that we shouldn't keep it. I can accept that it has to be sold, and I will cherish the zillions of memories of it, and I'm really, really happy that we gave it such a good send-off.
When official word came down at the beginning of the summer that my grandmother was putting the cottage up for sale, the first emotion that I felt was actually anger. I (and the other grandkids) were a little angry that our mothers didn't want to keep the cottage, which does, officially, belong to them. Oh we know the reasons why; my mother lives just that much further away now and it takes over 3 hours for her to get there. It's also not a place she can take her monster dogs to. Aunt #3 has a beautiful, fully-equipped farm (with pond, swimming pool, tennis courts and horses) as well as places in Bermuda and the Barbados, so she doesn't have a need to go up to the cottage. Aunt #1 lives 20 minutes away from Aunt #3's farm, so goes there. Aunt #2 goes to friends' places in Collingwood for golfing and such, so also doesn't feel need to go to cottage. So done deal as far as they're concerned.
But my brother, cousins and I were a little angry over the fact that the idea that we could keep it and continue to maintain it was just completely by-passed. It's like despite the fact that we are grown up, we're not grown up enough to maintain the cottage. We kinda resented that. We liked the idea of being able to go up and have some friends up now and then, something that we couldn't really do much of in the past because it was our grandparents' cottage and Grandma loves it up there; she goes up at the beginning of the summer and doesn't come down until the end of it. Grandad, on the other hand... never much of a fan.
But after some thinking, I could see the aunts' point. Of the grandkids, I'm the only one with a stable enough job to pay the property taxes and utilities on the cottage. Cousins #2 and 3 have good jobs now, but cousin #2 just got married and is saving for a house, while cousin #3's good job is down in NYC, so she's based down there. Cousin #1 is trying to find a job, whilst my brother and cousin #4 are both still in school. So yeah, I can't afford to maintain the cottage all on my own. Even though I'd really like to be able to take my kids up there.
Cousin #4 hit upon the idea of all us grandkids going up there to spend a last weekend with our grandparents. We all thought it was a grand idea and all of us (with the exception of cousin #3 who was working on her work visa and so couldn't leave the US again so soon after leaving to come up for her sister's wedding) went up, with significant others in tow. We had an absolute blast. Being so much older than my cousins, I haven't really had the opportunity to hang out with them for an extended period of time since they all kinda grew up (the exception being cousin #1 who is more like a younger brother to me), so I was really happy to have the time to hang out with them for an entire weekend.
While we were there, we were having so much fun that it didn't occur to me to be sad that this was most likely going to be the last time we'd ever be at the cottage. We went for boat rides (some canoe, some were for fishing), we went into Huntsville, some went for a run into Baysville, there were midnight swims, we made a game of heading off our grandparents' propensity for bickering, we had huge, sit down dinners together, we sat in the gazebo till late at night, smoking and drinking and talking and listening to tunes. And as I didn't bring my children, well, it was a wonderful little vacation.
So no, I wasn't sad while I was up there. But today, I actually saw the MLS listing for the cottage, and this, more than anything, has made me sad. The cottage was bought in the spring 1981, just before I turned eleven. From that summer until I went away to university, I spent every summer, ALL summer at the cottage. My mother took all summer off from work and she, my brother and I, spent all summer there with my grandparents. Three years later, at the age of two, cousin #1 joined us for the entire summer. You can see why we think of him more as a younger brother than a cousin. And on the weekends, or for various weeks here and there, a parade of other aunts, uncles, cousins 2,3 and 4 and my father would also join us. It's a small, shallow lake, so the water was always warm, there was a beach to dig in, boats to go fishing in, a creek to go catch minnows, frogs and turtles in, towns to go into when it rained, and the highlight of each and every week, Bingo in Baysville on Wednesday evenings. Of course I remember being bored there sometimes, but it wasn't as often as you'd think, since I always had lots and lots of books to read.
So now I'm sad thinking back on those days. They've been gone for awhile of course, but the cottage was still there for us to go back to whenever we could. But soon it won't be. I won't be able to take my kids up there and that also makes me sad. And of course, I'm faced with the extremely sad realization that my grandparents are just getting too old to be up there for long stretches by themselves. It's not fun to finally have to think of my grandparents as 'old', even though they're both still pretty spry for being in their late 80s.
I wish we could keep it. I wish the reality didn't point out that we shouldn't keep it. I can accept that it has to be sold, and I will cherish the zillions of memories of it, and I'm really, really happy that we gave it such a good send-off.