Well, this is the fifth day back from vacation. It was a good one, weather-wise, family-wise, and fun-wise. I guess some of my favorite memories are just sitting on the beach, watching the tide coming in and going out and observing my family..all four generations (counting me) interacting.
Some of the memories are:

o The sand castle contest. Ava, Atticus, Shane, Regina, Zach and Ian each made their own and then explained and described it. Ava's won for its ecology, Shane for his humor (the stupid people made their homes outside of the castle wall), Regina most unusual (her castle was underground) and Atticus for most elaborate. Ian only used his hands, no shovel and Zach had a trench going several feet, the longest.

o Finding the skeleton. On a beach walk, Ava yelled to me "Linny, look at that" pointing to a large skeleton high on the rocks. Jer identified it as a seal or a dolphin and decided to take it home with him. He recovered it in the dark of night and rode home next to it in the back seat.

o The food. Kevin caught bluefish,bass and striper which Jer cooked for us...bluefish on a plank and leftover bass made into fish cakes. The fish cakes were voted the best of all. I made oysters Rockefeller, but couldn't find the spinach (we never did find out what happened to it), but they were a hit when I added cream cheese.

o The cocktail party. The girls came down the hill from Laura's cottage all dressed up, high heels, gorgeous outfits and eye makeup. Helene found a dress in the Wellfleet Thrift shop that was perfect and I wore a pantsuit that was about 20 years old. Atticus kept grabbing the pants part saying, "I can't believe they are pants". I guess she never saw anything like that. Maureen wore a black dress with a large moon necklace and Caitlin made Pina Coladas and Marquaritas.

o The refrigerator going up the stairs to Laura's cottage. The cottages were experiencing power surges and Laura's refrigerator died. When the handyman came to replace it, he was alone and started the long trek up many steps to the cottage. We were enjoying Happy Hour on the deck, watching the whole show. It was like the Laurel and Hardy when they have to move a piano up a hundred steps. He made it, then a while later had to come down with the old one. A little entertainment for us.

o Elf shoes. Gabby (Jer's girlfriend) came back from Provincetown with a pair of green elf shoes, with the front toes pointing up. You had to smile to see them.

o O'Leary visit. John and his family came, and had a surprise, my great neice Catlin with them. The seven girls sat in the house, eating, texting and being girls. Good looking bunch.

o The kids. Solomon and Henry in the water, laughing, Shane threatening his brother Zach, "If you touch this sand castle, I will put your face in the sand and stand on your head until you are dead." Pretty good threat that worked. My bedroom was over the back yard and one night I heard...Do you have the flashlight? Where's the shovel? OK. let's bury it. I think they were burying a broken pingpong paddle, but I will never know.

So that's it...I will probably think of a hundred more. That's what vacations are for, memories that pop in your head that make you smile.

One of Bucky's favorite sayings was "after the Fourth of July the summer is over". It used to drive us nuts because summer was just starting, but I realize now there is some truth to that. The stores are already advertising back to school items. I read an article where a woman's father use to say on June 22, the first day of summer, "well, that's it, now it is going to get darker earlier everyday". Maybe parents just have to torment their kids.

But I do notice signs that summer is going fast. The baby birds are just about all grown up, the first batch anyway. You still see a few "baby Huey's" bigger than their parents flapping their wings, nosily screaming, waiting to be fed some of my sunflower seeds. And the squirrels are all fighting for a place at the feeders, little mean red squirrels and big gray squirrels, but no more babies. With no rain for days past the bird baths are getting a lot of use. I do love to see the chipmunks and the squirrels taking advantage of them and leaning way over to get a drink. So summer is moving ahead.

Next week we will be in Wellfleet. The whole family is going and we are whipping ourselves into a seaside mindset. Lobsters, oysters, clams, beach umbrellas, are all we talk about. "Don't forget to bring the games, some good knives, these houses never have a good knife, do you think four pounds of butter is enough? I mean we are getting into a frenzy. I myself think the oil spill has something to do with it. Spill is not quite the word, gush is better. The ocean as we know it is being attacked, under seige by our own greed for oil. Will that mess makes it way to Cape Cod? Will the kids be making sand castles that are black? Will the seagulls be dropping the clams on the stones, flying down and then going "yuck" and leaving them there? With that in mind we are acting like this might be our last time for the beach as we know it. Maybe it is. So Wellfleet here we come.