September 7, 2021
When I was a child I spent many summers undergoing plastic surgery for my cleft lip and palate. As I healed I couldn't play sports or go swimming. But I have some special non surgical memories of wonderful weeks spent in Stone Harbor, N.J.
My Auntie Ruth had a cottage down the shore (that's how we say it up there). It was a small, cute cottage with a beautiful screened porch overlooking the bay. We weren't too far from the Yacht Club and on Sundays there would be sailboat races that were fun to watch. It seemed that the adults got to sleep on the porch and I was envious. Since then I've always wanted to live in houses with a screened porch.
In the kitchen, instead of a refrigerator there was an ice box and the ice man would deliver a big block of ice - how often I don't remember. This was back in the 1940s. Looking back I can't imagine how they kept perishables safely. But we never got sick. The ice box looked something like this.
I spent many hours on the dock. Small stairs led down into the bay. I used to be scared that one of the relatives of the crabs we caught and ate was going to bite my toes. I didn't like swimming in the bay much but it was nice to cool off.
Me on the dock
Later when I was a teenager we moved to Florida and I felt at home. It was like being down the shore with my soul at the beach.
Thank you for reading.
