| Summertime at Grammy and Grandpa's Old Saybrook.
Sleeping on the big old studio couch out on the screened front porch.
Being a little scared, cause the front door, was right
there. Saturday night bingo at the clubhouse over on the
next road. The old. red, Coca Cola soda cooler with the sliding metal
top, the bottle opener on the side. Hartford Club brand white birch
beer, in bottles so cold that they were frosted. The ice melting
on your fingers, running down your hand. So cold, so cold,
it would hurt when it hit your stomach. The birch beer stinging and
biting a spicy path all the way down. Birch beer is not sweet like
root beer. Somehow it made you feel more grown up. A rite of
passage, in liquid form.
The clubhouse: The smells of old wood, Evening in Paris and cigarettes. Always sand on the floor. Large metal fans stand in the corners of the room, moving the hot, moist, salt air. Long wooden tables and benches. The women in their light cotton floral print dresses. The men, if they came along would sit out back and do the things that men do. Drinking soda or maybe a snort off of a flask. Smoking, talking about sports, weather, those new fangle rocket ships. "Every time they shoot one'a them things up, the weather gets all crazy" the men would say. I think they had a card game in the back room. Poker of course, was more manly than bingo. Older kids would sit out on the front porch, and talk. The girls would giggle while trying to look cool. Cute, summer boys were walking by. Occasionally, they would walk down to the beach, being sure not to light their contraband cigarettes until they were well out of sight of the clubhouse. Waving their smoking hands, striking a almost adult pose. Learning to inhale. Most of the people there where in cottages, either that they owned, or they were renting for vacation. Always a few new faces. Bingo! Then moans and sighs from the almost winners. Prizes were household items; percolator, toaster, a blanket perhaps. I won a styrofoam surf board. I remember playing with it at the beach the next day. The combination of sand, saltwater, and styrofoam giving me an awful rash on my legs and arms. Sunburn. No such thing as sun block. If you get burned, Noxema would fix it up. I loved to walk in Grammy's garden.
To my child size eyes, it was enormous. A square border, grass walkway
and a circle of flowers and a birdbath shaped like a daisy in the middle.
Even though I was only a few steps from the house, I always felt that I
was in a magical place there. I could hide from the world(I couldn't)
and just enjoy being a kid. Lily of the valley along the side of
the house. Morning glories climbing the light pole.
Bleeding hearts and old strains of Roses.
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