Cottage

A bracing gale blows spindrift across the bay: the tops of whitecaps blown into lines of foam perpendicular to the wave’s crest. Grey skies of winter bring flurries blown horizontally and snowflakes that never seem to land. Dry beach sand hisses, flowing over rocks, driftwood and dune grass. Brants huddle along a lee shore.

Boarded up against the elements a cottage hibernates. Hidden behind dunes on a beach seldom visited in winter it waits for the arrival of warm summer days when the smell of salt air and the call of gulls greet guests Today the swing made of chain and driftwood sways in response to gusts.

June brings children racing at the water’s edge, making castles and filling their swimsuits with sand. Parents and grandparents lounge, recalling so many years ago when they played on the same beach. Now they are content to read or nap when the kids are not too close to the water.

Later, as the sun approaches the horizon, outdoor showers wash sand and sunscreen away. Shorts and sweatshirts replace swimsuits. Someone lights a campfire on the beach. Hot dogs sizzle eventually giving way to s’mores. Much later cousins climb onto makeshift beds while aunts and uncles tuck in the youngest, maybe read a story, and return to the shore to reminisce and gaze at the stars. Eventually everyone is inside, and asleep, either on the floor in a sleeping bag or in on one of the few coveted beds. A gentle breeze cools sunburned skin.

But now the cottage waits patiently until that day in late May when the crunching of gravel under a pickup’s tires announces the arrival of the caretaker to lift the plywood from windows and the padlocks from doors. When pipes, drained in October, are again filled with water and when the remnants of winter are swept from the porch. When the cottage takes a deep breath and welcomes the season.