When you live in Michigan, summers can be pretty unpredictable. One day you’ll be drowning in a freak thunderstorm, and the next it will be 95 degrees and so humid that you stick to everything you touch. Every summer has a little something different than the last, but for me, one thing has never changed. Because to me, summer has always meant cottage season. And cottage season is arguably the best part of summer.
Chances are if you ask someone in Michigan where his or her cottage is, they will probably say “up north.” “Up north” usually translates to “somewhere near Petoskey” or someone pointing to a spot on their hand while it’s in the shape of a mitten. In my case, I just leave the country altogether and book it straight to Canada. I am fortunate enough to have spent every summer of my life on the shores of Lake Erie in Canada, wasting away my weekends in the best way, at our little cottage amongst a whole beach of other little cottages.
All of those other little cottages are inhabited by family, some by blood, some not. But when you mash us all up together on one beach, you get one giant cottage family. Cottage family is easily the best part of having a cottage season. You’re completely surrounded by happy people the whole time you’re there. And every once in awhile we get a new cottage family member. That’s one more pair of sandy little toes that leave tiny footprints in the sand and on your heart. Being one of the only little girls on the beach, I’m sure I made my footprints, but now that I’m older, the little ones are starting to leave their footprints on me.
Being one of the “big kids” on the beach is weird for me. There’s so many things that the tiny humans do that I can’t, and I guess that is a part of growing up, but every once in awhile I get the chance to feel little again. I never pass up sitting in the bow during a boat ride, just to get the butterflies when you bounce up on a wave. I never say no to tubing, even if that only means sitting in the tube with a little one that’s too scared to go alone. I never say no to walking down the beach to a bonfire, and still can’t pass up a s’more once I get there. I know for a fact that I will never be too old for cottage season. Never. With only a few weeks left of classes, cottage season will soon be upon us, bring on the sunburns and whatever else a summer in Canada has to offer.
