What Do You Remember About Summer Vacation?

 

I'm not sure how they do it in other countries (nor do I really care), but just like every kid in America when I was going to grade school I lived for the day when school was out for the summer.  Summer vacation was here, and it was time to kick back, relax, and have fun!

I started school in 1963 when my family was living in Central Gardens outside of Richmond, Virginia, and while I had two summer vacations from school while we were living there I really don't remember them.  What I remember about living there was NOT going to school while my two older sisters did.  I remember being at home with my mom while my pop was at work, watching her starch and iron his shirts.  She would use liquid starch and a 16 ounce Pepsi bottle that was filled with water, with a tin sprinkler stopper stuck into it.  She'd shake the bottle over the shirt and water would sprinkle out, and then she'd iron the shirt.  All this while watching "Dialing For Dollars" on the black and white TV in the living room

Whenever I think of summer vacations when I was a kid (which meant pre-high school) I always think of the summer vacations when we were living in Highland Springs, also outside of Richmond.  We lived in Highland Springs from the time I was in the 4th grade up until the summer after I finished the 9th grade, and that was the summer we moved from Virginia to North Carolina.  

I gotta tell ya, I absolutely loved those summer vacations in Highland Springs!  Getting up when I wanted to and not when I had to, being out of the house all day, riding my bike all over creation and back, camping with my Boy Scout troop, hiking in the woods - yeah, those summer vacations back in those days were a blast!

I guess the one thing I remember most about those summer vacations started the year I finished 5th grade, because that was the year I started taking Band and learned how to play the cornet.  That was the summer that I started taking Summer Band.  More than half of the kids in the school band also took it, so it was pretty much just a continuation of what we were doing when school was in session.

But the BIG difference was that this time we were doing it because we WANTED to and not because we HAD to.  That made it fun, and that's what Summer Band was all about.

Summer Band was held at Highland Springs High School, and the school was located about a mile or so away from my house - close enough that when I started going to the high school in 1971 I had to walk instead of take the bus.  It was also well within bike-riding range, so three times a week on Monday, Wednesday and Friday I'd slide the handle of my cornet case over the handlebars of my Schwinn Stingray bicycle, pedal my butt up to the high school for Summer Band, and then repeat the process two hours later to go home.  I had a lot of fun in Summer Band, and even learned to play the drums one summer (which I royally sucked at).  

Aside from Summer Band, I also remember riding my bicycle literally all over the county.  I lived in an area that was smack dab in the middle of the Seven Day's Battlefield from the War for Southern Independence, and there were no less than four battlefields within riding distance of my house.  There was Seven Pines, Beaver Dam Creek, Fair Oaks, and my personal favorite, Cold Harbor.  That last one was the furthest away and would take the better part of an hour to get to, but once you got there it was great.  The area was heavily wooded which meant that it was always in the shade and therefore cool, and after a long hot bike ride in the Virginia summertime heat that coolness was just wonderful!  We'd go to the Visitor's Center and look at all of the artifacts, then ride our bikes through the battlefield itself before riding home.

Then there were the camping trips with my Boy Scout troop.  I loved camping with those guys, and we had a lot of good times on those camping trips.  I learned all about snipe hunts when I was a Boy Scout, a lesson that I later passed on to my children the first time I took them camping.  (And my son is still pissed at me about that, by the way!)

Last but certainly not least were the days we spent playing in the local woods, a wooded area at the end of Pine Street.  Pine Street was two streets over from mine, and those woods invariably became known as "The Woods on Pine Street."  Anytime I was leaving the house and was going to be gone for the day, if I told my mom I was going to The Woods On Pine Street she knew exactly where I was going to be.  I'm not sure how big that wooded area was, but as I recall it was plenty big - big enough where you could ride your bike through it and it would take nearly half an hour to get to the other side on Washington Avenue, and if you were on foot you could play in there all day long and never see civilization once.  

The last time I went to Highland Springs in 2005 for the 30th Reunion of the HSHS Class of '75 I drove down to Pine Street, and was saddened to see that the woods were gone.  The area has been developed and is full of houses now.  What a shame.  Progress, I guess.

But overall, I guess the thing I remember the most about summer vacation in those days was NOT spending much time in the house.  The only time I was in the house was if it was raining, and I don't remember a lot of those days at all.  If the sun was out I was out of the house, and I'd be gone for the day.  My mom never had to worry about where I was or what I was doing for two reasons:  she knew that I had been taught better than to go out and get in trouble, and the world was a much better and safer place back in those days.  As long as I was home by 6 in time to eat dinner everything was fine, and I knew better than to be late.  

Ah, those were the days.  The older I get the more I think about them, and the more I think about them the more I miss them.  But one thing life has taught me is that you can never go back, you can never go home again, and I guess that's true.

And in most cases, I guess that's for the best.  We only remember the good times about the past anyway, right?

So what do you remember about summer vacation?

Deo Vindice

IHC