Member-only story
Sarah Coyne Campground, Age 7
I’m forever a Lake Erie girl
White marshmallows over a blazing yellow orange fire, I can smell the burning wood (my favorite scent) and hear the crackles from the log.
Sand covers my legs and my feet as I pull my legs into my chest.
I hear the lake lapping in, the sound of water meeting the sand. Thinking of how the waves seem impossible large further out in the lake but they’re so small at the meeting point.
My grandmother’s wrinkled and well-worn (and loved) face smiles in the illuminated darkness. She’s in her blue Buffalo Ladies Club t-shirt, with her name embroidered on the top left. Signs of a club that she’s belonged to for a decade and peach culottes.
For now, all I want to do is soak in this moment. Watch Kathy, the lady with short white hair, who owns the trailer on the beach whisper things to my grandmother, invoking infectious laughter.
She’s amongst friends that she’s had for years, friends that don’t know that she’s going to sell her trailer further down the beach.
She doesn’t want to focus on or discuss her health issues which would later that year lead to her leg being amputated.
She also wants to focus on these moments with friends, as she regularly reminds me to do. Doesn’t want…
