When I was a kid, Moose Mountain carried mythical qualities.\u00a0 My family went there every summer and every Christmas vacation.\u00a0 My parents threatened us with not going if our grades weren’t up to snuff, and by the time I figured out this was a ruse, I was too old to worry — I made sure my grades were good enough for other reasons.\u00a0 But I would have hated to miss a trip to Moose Mountain.
\nWe sledded and tubed down the mountain in the winter.\u00a0 We ice skated.\u00a0 We made S’mores around the fire.\u00a0 In the summer, we swam and hiked the trails and made S’mores around the fire.\u00a0 I’ve never had S’mores anywhere but Moose Mountain.
\nOur cheeks were red from the cold in the winter and red from too much sun in the summer.\u00a0 Moose Mountain didn’t have organized activities.\u00a0 We kids got up when we got up and met the other kids out in front of the lodge in the morning, and we played outside all day in the summer time, periodically stopping back at the lodge for Kool-Aid and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (or just peanut butter or just jelly, but if anyone didn’t want the crust, they had to take that off themselves — the moms weren’t interested in catering to fussiness; they were on vacation, too).\u00a0 In the winter, we met in the lodge’s lobby in the morning, headed outside to sled or tube down the hill until we got cold, then we trooped back into the lobby for hot cocoa around the big circular fireplace before heading back outside again.
\nWho knew or cared what our parents did all day or all night.\u00a0 Certainly not me or my siblings.\u00a0 We were left to our own devices and had to solve most of our several squabbles with other Moose Mountain kids on our own.\u00a0 We “regular” Moose Mountain kids, the ones like us who came back every year, were cliquish around the first timers, but that was more of an initiation thing.\u00a0 After the first day or two, they were judged on their own merits.\u00a0 Most of them did okay.\u00a0 We weren’t a tough crowd.
\nThen there were the “little” kids.\u00a0 I started out as one, as did my younger siblings behind me.\u00a0 We had a definite pecking order.\u00a0 I didn’t know this until it was my turn, but each year the oldest kids, who were going to be too old to return with their parents the next season, indoctrinated the next younger kids into the ways of Moose Mountain.\u00a0 In that way, the traditions passed from generation to generation.\u00a0 I hadn’t noticed it, but this was true with all age groups.\u00a0 They oriented the “new” kids, and then they kept orienting others coming up, because while I made it sound like we all played together, it wasn’t quite that way.\u00a0 There was an etiquette, and you didn’t go against the grain.\u00a0 We kids would talk to our parents, and some families didn’t return.\u00a0 We wanted only the right kind of people at Moose Mountain, and it didn’t have anything to do with the color of your skin or your religion or how much money your father made.\u00a0 It had everything to do with whether you could follow the etiquette or not.
\nI almost forgot that the summer I turned thirteen.\u00a0 I guess I got a little full of myself and thought I should be able to hang out with the high school kids on their trails.\u00a0 There’s a price for such things, and the older kids made sure I paid it.\u00a0 A huge floating dock was in the middle of the lake.\u00a0 That dock was high schooler domain.\u00a0 It was a little further out than I could swim, but I commandeered a canoe and slipped out there to join the older kids.\u00a0 They seemed to accept me, but by the time I found myself all alone on the dock without a canoe, it was too late.\u00a0 Turns out they’d distracted me and made off with my canoe and all the other canoes they’d used to get out there, leaving me with the strongest swimmer, who said, “I gotta’ run.\u00a0 See you later” as he dived into the water and swam back.\u00a0 I knew I couldn’t swim back.\u00a0 I hollered for him to come back or to bring me a canoe, but all he did was tread water long enough to yell back, “You little kids need to not try to hang out where you don’t belong. Now shut up and stay put.”
\nThey left me to stew for an hour.\u00a0 Finally, around dusk and the time parents began wondering where their kids were, one of the older kids slipped up behind me in a canoe and scared me half to death when he said from behind me, “Get in, punk.” I had to sit facing him all the way back to the lakeshore, and he glared stonily past my shoulder, clearly pissed that he’d had to come out and get a little kid who was too big for his britches.
\n***
\nI recently returned, anticipating wonderful things.\u00a0 The lodge and grounds seemed small and shabby.\u00a0 The dock?\u00a0 It couldn’t have been more than thirty-five yards off shore.\u00a0 I was shocked.\u00a0 This? This was the place I couldn’t wait to return to every summer and Christmas vacation?\u00a0 I couldn’t believe it.\u00a0 I almost turned around and left, but I’d made reservations and paid in advance.\u00a0 Non-refundable, of course.\u00a0 I stepped inside.\u00a0 This lobby was where we’d crammed all of us around the fireplace?\u00a0 So small.
\nThen Mr. Moose came out from the office behind the counter.\u00a0 Yes, Moose Mountain was named for the proprietor.\u00a0 We’d always laughed about that when watching Captain Kangaroo back home.\u00a0 “Matthew Evans! Finally made it in from the dock, I see.”\u00a0 He winked.
\nI shook my head.\u00a0 “You’ll never let me live that down, will you?”
\nHe laughed, “Nope. Welcome back.\u00a0 I’m happy to see you here.”
\n“Thanks.\u00a0 It seems…smaller than I remember it.”
\n“You’re taller.”
\n“True.”
\nMr. Moose slid a key across the counter.\u00a0 “You’re pre-registered and pre-paid.\u00a0 I think you’ll find this room very familiar.\u00a0 Dinner at six.\u00a0 Enjoy your stay.”
\n***
\nDinner was always family style.\u00a0 Everyone came down to the dining hall and sat at tables for ten, and big bowls of vegetables, potatoes, and platters of meat were passed around the table.\u00a0 Nothing had changed, but I was still in for a surprise.\u00a0 I was the last one down for dinner, but I didn’t pay much attention to who else was there until I heard, “Matty!”
\nI looked in the direction of the voice, then I looked again, “Charity?”
\nCharity gave a mock look of surprise, “You did remember. See anyone else you remember?”
\nOnly then did I look around the dining room. “Wha…” Nearly everyone from my age group from all those summers and Christmases growing up was there. “What are all you guys doing here?”
\nDana chimed in (like he always had growing up), “We figured it was time for a reunion.”
\n“Yeah, we want to see you find your way back in from the float.”\u00a0 Byron.\u00a0 Moose’s son.\u00a0 Count on him to not let me forget the float incident, too.
\nI shook my head.\u00a0 “You guys can’t get enough of that, can you?\u00a0 Did you know it inspired me to become a competitive swimmer?”
\nDana called out, “How competitive?”
\nI shrugged.\u00a0 “Didn’t get selected in the Olympic Trials, but at least I got asked to compete.”
\nCharity tugged on my arm, “Come on!\u00a0 Sit down.\u00a0 Dinner’s getting cold.”
\nWe sat down to eat and hash over old times.<\/p>\n
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