Vacation Day One

Day One – Vacation

We rented a cabin on a lake about two and a half hours away from home. Both boys brought books to read in the car. I was looking forward to a relaxing drive, listening to music, having a pleasant conversation with Jon. Sometimes I wonder why I continue to delude myself in this manner. As I should have foreseen, Spencer decided within thirty minutes of riding in the car that he did not want to read any longer. Well, that is not completely accurate. Spencer did not spend even those first thirty minutes reading (at least as that word is usually understood). He spent the first twenty minutes “reading” and the next ten minutes actually reading. To explain, I began the car trip by relaying the plot of a movie I had recently watched. Both boys love stories of all sorts, so I often tell them the plots of books I read or movies I watch. Spencer thought that the time spent listening to me talk should count as reading time. Instead of questioning Spencer’s veracity, one might wonder why Spencer monitors and tracks the time he spends doing various activities. The answer is that both Michael and Spencer are involved in reading programs this summer that require a certain amount of reading each day/week in order to earn a free book. And thinking about this now, I wonder if perhaps I ought to be more diligent when Spencer tells me that he read for 150 minutes during the day because maybe he means “read” (i.e., watched a movie) and maybe he means read (i.e., actually read a book). Hmmm…

But, back to the trip. Truly, both boys are quite good in the car. They entertain themselves better than I was able to do at their ages. There is very little conflict or complaint. On this trip, Michael decided to read most of the way. Michael continues to be an avid reader. It is hard to keep him in books. When we were approximately an hour from our destination, Spencer came up with a new game. He did not call it a game, nor did he preface, in any way, what he was doing. He began merely by asking me, “What should I turn into an agate?” I thought for a few seconds and responded with some uncertainty (it was more of a question really), “the street?” “Okay,” Spencer responded cheerfully. He then made a series of tones and whirring noises and exclaimed that it was done, the street was an agate. “What should I change next?” This game lasted for thirty minutes or so with Spencer changing basically everything I could think to name (bridges, light posts, playgrounds, railroad tracks, signs, sidewalks, houses, garages, schools, all other buildings, billboards, picnic tables, rocks, etc.) into agates. He refused to turn some things, like trees and plants, into agates. In the last five minutes or so, he spiced things up by turning certain objects I named into pearls, or emeralds or gold. The time flew by.

We arrived at the cabin and got settled. I could see the boys were excited about the cabin, but that excitement was tempered a bit by Jon and me. Somehow neither Jon nor I were quite prepared for the cabin. I mean, both of us have been in (lots of) cabins before. And both of us knew we were going to a cabin for the week. And yet, when it came right down to it, I don’t think either of us expected the cabin to be quite so much like a cabin. But we adjusted. The cabin was nice. It was big. It was clean (mostly). The boys and I changed into our swimsuits. There was a small sandy beach with comfortable chairs. The water was shallow and a little weedy. I did not go in the water, but the boys (and Luka) went swimming. We had a good day.