DOWN MEMORY LANE

 THE PAST IS THE PAST ( a.k.a.) DOWN MEMORY LANE

We sat around the fireplace, our marshmallows dangling precariously over the flames, suspended on small crooked branches gleaned from the nearby woods. What had started as an epic marshmallow roast over a huge bonfire had ended abruptly when the heavens opened up and a torrential rainfall wiped the fire out in mere minutes. Gail had grabbed the marshmallows, Melody the wine and I grabbed the tray with the rest of the fixings for the s’mores. We had already eaten the more than slightly charred hotdogs so at least we weren’t going to starve, but we had been so looking forward to our annual outdoor retreat, weenie and marshmallow roast.  We would have a glass of wine in one hand and a s’more in the other, sit back in our slightly moldy lawn chairs, and stare at the stars. We’d reminisce about old times and catch up with the new events in each other's lives. But now the festivities had changed venues and we huddled around the Franklin Fireplace that I was trying to coax into a flame big enough to cook our s’mores and dry out our slightly sodden clothes.

This was our tenth anniversary. We had started this annual reunion after we met at a summer camp when we were twelve years old. Looking back it was kinda corny to celebrate an anniversary because it's not like we were married or anything. But Melody wanted to do it and Gail and I went along with the idea. The first few years were a little difficult to pull together, but Melody was adamant and she had the financial resources and her family had the clout to carry out her plans. Her Nanny or one of the maids always accompanied us to the chalet until at sixteen Melody got her own car and was able to drive us to the chalet herself. Melody always said when married couples celebrate an anniversary they always give a traditional gift and that we should honour this tradition of symbolic gift giving on the occasion of the anniversary of our meeting. So ten years as Best Buds or BFFs would be celebrated with the giving of something tin or aluminum. 

 Gail always made us a thoughtful gift to celebrate the occasion. This year it was an antique cookie tin filled with her homemade cookies. Homemade cookies might seem very provincial but then you haven't tried Gail’s cookies before. Gail is a gourmet cook and owns her own bakery and catering company. So when I tell you that she brought a tin of cookies this is something to write home about or I guess nowadays we might say this is something to tweet about.

Melody brought a picture of the three of us, taken years ago, the summer we first met. She had added an intricately carved tin or aluminum frame which gave it a delicate filigree look. I had a sneaky suspicion that the frame was not either tin or aluminum but rather silver or even platinum, but who am I to say?  

  I had brought nothing so tasty or sentimental to our shindig, but then I never did. My gift wasn’t handmade, expensive, or well thought out, but then it never was. I had brought some aluminum baking pans. Something practical and functional, and that filled the bill. Filled the requirement of a tenth anniversary whose symbol was tin or aluminum, Over the years we had given gifts of paper, cotton, leather, fruit or flowers, wood, candy, wool, pottery, and lastly, willow.

The three of us were tight now, but I originally couldn’t stand either Melody or Gail. I thought they were both entitled little rich kids at least as far as I could see those first few days. I hated Melody from the start, actually even before I even saw her.  I remember it well, I was sitting on a rock in the roundabout drop-off area of the White Feather Summer Camp. My cheap little suitcase stood in front of me,  and I sat, not quite knowing what to do or where to go, having been dumped unceremoniously by my case worker in the kiss-and-ride area. I got the ride but definitely, no kiss as I'm sure my case worker was glad to get me off of her hands for a whole summer. I was always a bit of a handful.

Suddenly,  this long black stretch limousine pulled up.  All it lacked was state flags fluttering in the breeze to mark it as some dignitary's car, or maybe ahead of state, or embassy car. The chauffeur dashed around and opened the car door. A gentleman in a three-piece suit exited first, his hair slicked back, pocket watch chain dangling, gleaming in the sunlight, He turned and with a flourish extended his hand to the other occupant of the car as the limo driver started taking a plethora of suitcases from the capacious trunk. The hand that grasped the gentleman's hand was tiny and he drew her gently from the limo. She stepped out and I knew this was no dignitary but a real live princess. She wore a pale pink suit and a coordinating clutch purse in her other hand. A bloody clutch purse, I mean who these days carries a clutch purse to camp? To compound the issue and add to my intense dislike, she wore a single strand of perfectly matching pearls that encircled her tiny neck. I just knew that my mouth was open like a codfish. I had a moment of complete confusion and didn’t know if I should rise, make a bow, or run screaming into the woods. Instead, I felt myself freeze. They say people in difficult situations either use one of two methods to deal with the situation. Fight of flight. They need to amend that saying. I did neither the fight nor fight option. I opted for the freeze option. I sat there on my rock, with my mouth hanging open in a most unbecoming manner, and froze like a block of ice.

The camp director rushed forward and in a gushing manner welcomed the faux princess to the camp and said he would show them to their finest cabin which they had only just completed the renovations on. He led them away and the chauffeur struggled behind with four large suitcases.

As I sat there in stunted surprise another car pulled up. I didn’t know much about sports cars, I mean they don’t exactly show up often at the orphanage where I grew up. But although I didn’t know the brand, I was later informed it was a Lamborghini. I once saw a red Corvette convertible pull up to the orphanage and thought it was the most beautiful car in the world. I dreamed that the driver had come to take me away and adopt me. That dream was very short-lived. The driver had simply gotten lost and needed directions. I sat on the cement stairs and cried as it drove back down the driveway.

 But I ramble on.

So out of the sports car hops this handsome man and suddenly everybody in the kiss-and-ride area is standing with their mouths open like a cod fish. The whispering suddenly sounds like a busy hive of bees. And the mothers dropping off their kids start fanning themselves like a desert wind just blew in. It wasn’t till later that I found out he was a major movie star. Anyway, the kid gets out of the car, she's dressed like some rockstar with a bright blue wig and chewing gum a mile a minute. Out comes the director’s wife from her office and off they go to the same cabin that the princess went into a few minutes before. I immediately disliked her too., strictly on principle.

I sat on the rock for a while longer until a counselor finally asked me my name and checked her clipboard. She stared at my tattered suitcase for a full minute like she thought it was filled with snakes or something. 

“Oh yeah,” she finally said, “The charity case. Well, it's your lucky day. Looks like you’re in the remodeled cabin. I guess you will be hobnobbing with the rich and famous.”  She started down the trail. “Bring your stuff,” she ordered.

 I couldn’t believe it. I think my mouth fell open …  again. The remodeled cabin. That's where they put the princess and the rockstar.  I picked up my suitcase carefully, holding the broken handle together, and trotted after her.

And so began a crazy summer where I learned not to always judge a book by its cover, or  kids from their cars, as the case may be. By the end of the week, we became inseparable and started calling ourselves the Three Musketeers. Not very original but hey, we were only twelve. And so started a relationship that flourished for ten years and now we sat back drying our clothes and hair by the fireplace and begging Gail to make one of her fabulous concoctions with the s’mores. Sometimes she added Rollos instead of simple chocolate and when you bit into them the caramel would ooze out and make your fingers sticky. Sometimes she would add peanut butter or raspberries or strawberries, Nutella or white chocolate, mint chocolate or brownie s'mores. Each year I waited the whole year in anticipation, just to find out what she would do with the s’mores at our next reunion.

 So when the rain drove us indoors we retreated to the chalet, which is one of the properties owned by Melody's Dad.  It was always the place that we used for our reunions although the family rarely visited the place.  Melody said she loved the chalet more than any other place in the world because her late mother and her father had honeymooned here before her father came to own about ten percent of the world.  Mel had told us on our first visit that the place was very small and humble, but Melody’s idea of small and humble and mine are worlds apart. We basked in the sauna or sat in luxury in one of the two hot tubs, or swam in the indoor pool.

 I started a fire in the fireplace, the Princess and the Rockstar of course knew nothing about making a fire even though Gail was great with an oven.

 Once dry, Princess Melody sat on the white couch in her designer jeans and shirt, and she started to talk about the summer we met. Reminiscing as she did every reunion. That summer was the first time she had been away from her father, the father who had so recently brought home a new young wife. She did not care for her new stepmother and the feeling was mutual. Her stepmother Lorraine did not want to have a twelve-year-old daughter and felt that having a child who would soon be a teenager would advance her years more than she was willing to admit to. So Melody was glad to be at camp for the summer, even though she would miss her father. Her new stepmother had told her that when she returned from camp she would be enrolled in a French Boarding School for the school year. Melody reminisced about her years before camp and the trips she had taken with just herself and her father.  Melody loved to talk and I was always a willing listener.   Characteristically, Melody changed topics and suddenly said, “Remember the lifeguard at camp? What was his name? Troy? Wasn’t he dreamy?

Gail broke in, “Oh yeah Troy! I had such a crush on him. He was the first one to teach me how to make s’mores. I remember it was the first campfire of the season and Troy was the one in charge of making smores.  I asked him if I could help him and he let me. He taught me everything I know about s’mores.”

“I bet that's not all he taught you”, Melody said slyly.

“Melody, I was twelve years old, and he was at least five years older,” Gail said indignantly.” He was just a summer crush. But I have a little something to tell you guys. There’s this guy I am dating now, and believe me,  this is not a summer crush.”

“Tell us everything,” I demanded.

“Well as you know, my Dad not only acts but owns a string of restaurants and Paulo is the one who oversees all the restaurants. This might be a little premature but if he asks me and I think he will, I want your two to be my bridesmaids.” We spent the next hour talking about her plans.

Gail finally looked at me still sitting by the fireplace, “Tayla, how about you?  You are such a good listener but you never say anything about yourself. What's new with you?”

“Oh, you know me, same ole, same ole. Keeping busy running projects at the Y.”

 Melody leaned forward, “Don't you have any other ideas of what you want to do with your life, you are so clever, you can't reach your potential working at the YMCA as a volunteer.”

“I'm not a volunteer” I stated firmly. “I get a salary. I get paid”.

“But it must be a pittance,” continued Melody. “With your brains, you can do anything, be anything you want.”

“ I am something. I am a Social Worker. This is what I want.” I took a long sip of wine drained the glass and reached for the bottle. I filled the wine flute up to the top.

Mel reached her long slim hand down and touched my shoulder.

“I’m sorry, you’re right. You are clever and you are doing exactly what you should be doing and where you should be doing it. Ok now, this is a reunion, let's talk about when we were kids and about camp. She turned to me, “You go first Tayla, Gail and I are always talking about our childhood, the places we have been or done, you seldom say anything.”

 “ What's there to say, you both know my parents were killed when I was young and I lived in an orphanage. It wasn't always a happy place. It wasn't like the movie “Orphan Annie” who got rescued by a lonely millionaire, who took in an orphan.” I took another long sip and continued.

“ Some of those kids in the orphanage had serious mental health problems because of the things they had been through, they weren't all orphans, some of them had parents in jail or were taken out of their homes because they were mistreated. I know I always referred to it as an orphanage but it wasn’t actually an orphanage. I think orphanages went out of business in the 1960s or something. It was more a group home, and a residential treatment centre for kids that never got into the foster care system or never got unification with their families. Some people call it a children's home, and it is run by the Children's Aid Society. We just always called it an orphanage. I mean there was no Miss Hannigan, looking after a bunch of kids who scrub the floors and sing “It's a hard knock life” and no orphans singing “Tomorrow, tomorrow there's always tomorrow”. It's not like that. That's why I don't talk about it much. My ”Annie” experience was the summer camp where I met you two. Some lonely old person died and in their will, they gave a generous donation so that some lucky kid would get the experience at a summer camp for the season. I happened to be that lucky kid. It was just the “Luck of the Draw '' as they say. They literally pulled my name out of a hat. But every day you wake up at camp and listen to the birds singing, see the red canoes on the lake, hear the children laughing, eat s’mores by the fireside at night,  and you know … you know that at the end of the summer, you have to go back.  The last day of camp will end and well,... there is no “Tomorrow.”  The sun won't come out, and you will have days that are gray and lonely.  At the end of camp, your time has run out. And that in a nutshell is why I worked two jobs to put myself through college, to become a social worker, and now work at the YMCA. And you can bet your bottom dollar that ten years from now I’ll still be working at the Y hoping to make a difference in some kid's life.

“And that's why I never like reminiscing. Well, maybe a little about the summer we spent together but not about anything else. The past is the past. I love to hear you guys talk about your lives, and the places you’ve been, and the things you’ve done. But quite frankly other than one summer at summer camp where I met two incredible girls who were not what I expected, but I grew to love like sisters. Well, basically, most of my life sucked big time. I would always wait and hope and dream that someday some family would come and want me and want to adopt me but I guess it wasn't meant to be. But  I grew strong and independent, and I learned to love myself, and respect myself, and be happy with who and what I am. I was lucky to have two best friends who love me and support me and now I have only 365 days to figure out what to get you two for an anniversary present next year. Year eleven is steel, you know. Steel???  What should I do? Give you guys a steel beam. They all laughed, sipped their wine, and watched the fire.