Bicentennial Summer

We arrived at the enormous lake a half hour later, right before four o’clock, while the sun was still high in the sky and the temperature warm. We changed into our swimsuits and Keds at the lake, holding towels up between the front and back doors of Blue Pierre to make a privacy screen.

When we emerged in our bikinis, Dad whistled and said, “Ooh! Sexy.”

We cringed and crossed our arms over our chests, sharing an eye roll and a headshake with one another. We were accustomed to that type of remark from him. I often wondered why we even liked to spend time with him, given that he regularly made such comments. I guess the fun outweighed the icky. It reminded me of my best friend back home, Winnie Gravvers.

She and I were inseparable. We spent a lot of time together riding our bikes to Dairy Queen on hot summer days and swimming in her aboveground pool, acting out Jaws. In the winter, you’d find us tobogganing down our neighbor’s big hill or playing our favorite board game, Stock Market, on our small dining room table.

By the time Winnie was twelve, Dad had started to refer to her as the sexiest girl on  Crary Lane. He didn’t even bother calling her Winnie. He’d say, right to her face, “Is the sexiest girl on Crary Lane going to join us this weekend?” Winnie’s cheeks would go red, and she’d laugh uneasily. When I heard him speak that way, my skin would feel too tight, and I didn’t know where to put my hands or how to make myself smaller. We knew it was wrong for a grown man to call us girls sexy. And I could tell it upset my mom, too. Then he’d be funny or normal again, and I’d forget about the cringeworthy thing he’d said or done.

Our time in Lake Michigan was fun but short-lived. When we were in the water, the waves were like mountains, even though they didn’t seem that big at all from the shore. One big frothy wave knocked Gerri over, turning her around like a washing machine tumbling dirty socks. After sputtering to the surface, she was ready to get going.

“Come on, girls! Let’s get back on the road,” said Dad. “We still have a ways to go before we get to Teen’s.”

We quickly got back into our dry clothes, shivering despite the heat. The twins arranged our wet swimsuits and one small towel on the ledge behind the back seat to dry out. Knowing that we wouldn’t be doing much laundry on the road, we didn’t want mildewy suits and towels.

Jill pulled out her book and grabbed her pencil. Even though Blue Pierre was bounding along, she did a great job, neatly detailing our stop: 6/21/76 | Michigan | Swam in Lake Michigan. I decided to make a new entry to My Journal of Life, adding the mental image of the lake’s massive body reflecting the hard gold of the sun. It was so big; it felt like how I suspected the ocean to be. Then I tried in vain to forget Dad’s remarks about us girls being sexy, using a mental eraser to scrub away his words, replacing them with dialogue that felt more acceptable. More paternal. I decided on “You girls look great!”

But it didn’t work.

I knew, in my heart, that I’d remember he’d said that. What was worse was that I knew I’d also remember the way it had made me feel—that somehow I’d felt complimented by the remark, even if everything about it seemed so wrong that it’d made my skin crawl.

The entry documenting this trip in My Journal of Life wasn’t off to a great start.