The beach is one of my favorite places in the world.
I love the sand between my toes and the smell of the ocean in the air.
My grandfather owned a beach house in New Jersey for over 50 years.
He moved down to the beach with my grandmother about 11 years ago. I would spend my spring breaks down there and a week every summer. My brother and I had a secret "fort" upstairs with all our toys from when we were younger. We had a drum set in the garage that we never played on because, well, we didn't know how to play the drums.
This past summer, I spent a good amount of time at the beach.
My brother and I went down for a few weekends, visiting my grandfather and just going on little vacations together. I loved that, because he and I got closer with each other before I left for college.
We would go play mini golf together. He beat me all the time, but who really keeps score?
Getting closer with my brother and my grandfather was one of my favorite things about going to the beach this summer.
One of my favorite weeks from the summer, though, was when I spent the week down at the beach with my three best friends!
We were only supposed to go for a few days but ended up spending a week down there.
It was the first time we had all gone on vacation together. We also didn't have any adults staying with us, so we got to be little grown-ups for the week.
We spent a majority of our time at an arcade/outdoor mall called Bay Village
One thing I did learn from that trip is that you always need to make a grocery list, because we went to ACME seven times in four days because we always forgot everything that we need.
My favorite night of that week was when I took them out to a restaurant called Nardis.
That night, they met my grandfather.
They hit it off right away! They were sharing stories, hearing about his life and stories about me from when I was younger, and I couldn't have been happier.
Every day that I spent down at the beach was a new adventure, from going with my brother to my friends and to seeing my grandfather.
My relationship with all of them grew stronger and I have some amazing memories! If I could do it all over again, I would do it in a heartbeat.
