My K20D became a time machine a week ago while my wife and I were visiting - for the first time in years - our home town (Mt. Vernon, IL) to attend a memorial service for her brother. During our stay, we grabbed an afternoon to cruise our (primarily my) old teenage haunts, including a small lake north of town. In 1960, my Dad (who passed over in '95) bought a tiny cabin on the lake (one of twenty or so cabins comprising a 100+ year-old club that remains vital today); during my high school and college years, I practically lived there in the summer sailing, water skiing, sneaking cigarettes and generally being an obnoxious teenager.
The cabin brought joy to three generations; after my wife and I were married we visited every summer and our two daughters loved the place (delighting my parents). Both girls learned to water ski on this little lake. The cabin stayed with us for over four decades, but a couple of years after my Mom (RIP) had a severe stroke and we brought her to Texas, it became clear she could never live on her own again, and we sadly sold it after 44 years of family ownership.
I hadn't intended to take pictures, but the place has changed so little, it was - as Heinlein might have said - so temporally dislocating I couldn't help grabbing my camera and taking a few shots. Sorry for the long-winded preamble, but for all you first-stage baby boomers, I hope these lazy, hazy summer shots bring back the smells of beef on charcoal and outboard motor exhaust; the buzz of the Indy 500 on the radio, the feel of a ski rope pulling on your shoulders, and the sound of two glasspacks racking off when you let up on the gas pedal.
Jer
Our cabin was (and remains) the smallest in the club - Dad paid $750 for it; we think it was built around 1915:
The (continually) rebuilt dock behind the cabin; the only thing missing is a 1970 blue and white Glastron with a 55-HP Evinrude:
The club beach; for time immemorial the club has brought in sand for the "beach" in the summer. The old white Sunfish sits right where my similar (wooden!) Sailfish sat 40 years ago (gives me the willies!):
Here she is. My Dad added the aluminum windows and the glass under the eves during the late '60's; other than the A/C, the place looks exactly as it did when I was a teenage PITA: