My sketchbook and I have been spending a lot of quality time together lately. When I came across this photo I quickly got to work creating my own. It’s a little lopsided but I had fun with it:

Would you be willing to take 10 minutes out of your day to draw half of your face on a piece of paper and snap a photo of it? I’d love to see a whole bunch of these start popping up on the internet.

This is what I remember:

Bedtime at eight, though the sun remained in the sky for another hour, casting an orange glow over the rippling lake. Mom propped on one elbow, head resting on palm, while the other hand cradled Swiss Family Robinson. Bedtime stories by the light of summer dusk.

Summer sleep always unfolded on this porch, in a high bed that felt enormous. In my mind the bed was a raft, heaped with blankets, pillows, and afloat at sea. Perhaps this is why we started reading Swiss Family Robinson.

“For many days, we have been tempest-tossed,” Mom begins.

One sentence into chapter one, and I interject: “What’s ‘tempest-tossed, Mama?”

“What’s ‘tempest-tossed’? What’s ‘tempest-tossed’?!” (feigned shock). At once she grabs me with one arm, pulls me sharply against her soft body, then pushes me away. Then repeats, several times. “Whoooooosh whooosh,” she blows simultaneously, chaotically. “This is ‘tempest-tossed’! Do you feel it?”

I gasp to respond through my giggles, but it’s no use. The demonstration continues. Mom now lies on her back, holding me above her torso in a jostling version of ‘airplane ride’. My legs dangle on either side of her body, holding my balance as she whips me from side to side. I’m laughing so hard that I struggle for breath. She releases me and after a moment continues reading.

Fifteen feet away, water lap-laps against the shore, at the point where the dusty, pine needle covered ground slopes below the lake’s surface. Once, during a spring flood, the water rose to meet the base of the porch. This I do not remember except that my mom tells me it is so.

My hair is still sweet and damp after an obligatory shower (met with great protest) following that evening’s game of Swamp Orphans. When Mom rang the cowbell, summoning me for dinner (hot dogs, the only food I would willingly eat that summer), I arrived on the front steps covered in mud, twigs lodged in my hair. Mom made me dump the muck from my sneakers and remove my wet, blackened socks before entering the house.

Now, nestled in a big bed, on a porch surrounded by trees, water, and more trees, I listen as the night comes alive. Piney limbs groan and murmur to the wind (in winter it is the ice that makes these sounds, but louder, cracks echoing across the lake), and bullfrogs sing a guttural tune. A warm breeze embraces me. My breath softens in time with the woods as I sink deep into a dream world.

If this were every childhood, who would grow up to make war?

These photos were taken before the time change. Now when I leave work on Mondays it’s dark out. For a while this was what I got to see every time I walked to the further away subway. I was asked why I don’t ride my bike. I’ll endure 15 minutes on a crowded subway any day if it means half an hour of fall leaves and sunsets along the river.

Sometimes I need the slowness of walking.