Monday Memory

Did I ever tell you about the time(s)....

We'd go to the lake? Every year when I was about 5 - 7 years old, we would go out to the "Lake" for extended visits with friends. I don't know what lake it was. I know it was (is) somewhere in Florida (near the Tampa Bay Area). But, if I wanted to find it today, I couldn't. I also remember that it seemed to take us forever to get out there and now it's only about a 25 - 30 minute drive from my childhood home.

The Thompson's owned the property. We would go out there with three or four other families and all their children. I think there were about 10 - 15 kids and 8 - 10 adults. es. The Moms (all stay at home) would take us out during the week and then the Dads would join us on the weekends after work.

The property housed a trailer. I can't remember if it was double wide or not, but I know we crammed in there for sleeping purposMost of our days at the lake were spent swimming and fishing, though.

We used to build sand castles called "dribble castles". We would dribble wet sand on our masterpieces for hours until we had a work of art.

We fished for bream using bread or hotdogs for bait. We scooped up minnows into cups and determined we would take them home to put into our own aquariums (I don't think this ever happened).

We swam and swam. There was a floating dock and a rope swing near the shore. We would play "King of the Mountain" on the floating dock. Everyone would stand on the dock and try to not get knocked off. The last person standing was the King of the Mountain.

One of the Dad's, Mike, who was a prankster loved to go "get" a creature from the bottom of the lake and bring "her" up to scare us. He would go to the bottom, cover his entire head with seaweed and grass from the bottom then come up and talk in a funny voice. I think I was scared of this at first, but soon came to LOVE "her" visits!

I remember eating my first pimento cheese sandwich there and okra (not necessarily at the same meal). I didn't really like either of them. I also remember waiting VERY impatiently after every meal the "required" 15 minutes so we wouldn't get an "upset stomach" from swimming. I don't think I have ever made my children do this, but we sure had to. It was painstaking and long.

I don't know why we don't have any pictures from these visits. There were so many of them, and to my knowledge, none are recorded in photos. I can still see it though. I can picture the shore where we played. I can almost smell the fresh water. I can hear the laughter and giggles of children playing for hours upon end (with no TV or game system)and adults who were genuine friends and enjoyed just sitting and gabbing with each other.

In the words of an old song...."Those were the days my friends, we thought they'd never end..."