Theme Thursday: Water

I just had to link up with Cari at Clan Donaldson today, because the theme this week is so apropos.  I've got water on the brain.

My husband grew up in a house on a lake, in northern New York.  We just came back from a visit up there with two of my husband's sisters and their broods, and I snapped a couple of pictures the other day as I was sipping my first cup of coffee in the a.m.  The morning sun was shining on the water, making it sparkle like diamonds.  That's what my late mother-in-law used to say, as she sat in her comfy stuffed chair in the kitchen, staring out at the view: "The lake is diamonds."

It's astonishingly beautiful, isn't it?  Is it any wonder that my husband and his seven siblings gravitate to their childhood abode every summer with their families in tow, to be together again in such heavenly surroundings?

To this day, my hubby could sit and stare at the water for hours on end, mesmerized.  The view right out behind his childhood home is his favorite on earth--and as an airline pilot who's been flying hither and yon for a quarter of a century (to breathtakingly beautiful spots, both foreign and domestic), trust me, he's seen a lot of terrific views.  Give him a Diet Mt. Dew or a beer (depending on the hour of day) and a deck chair to sit in, and he could be happy for hours on end, just sitting on the deck of his parents' house, gazing at the water.

When my mother-in-law died in 2009 (six years after we lost my father-in-law), my husband and his siblings decided to keep the house and share it equally, rather than sell it and split up the proceeds, and they formed an LLC to manage its upkeep.  This year, a new sea wall was built in order to shore up the bank, because they were losing so much real estate to erosion.  Atop the sea wall is a gigantic patio like you've never seen before: I believe my husband could land one of his 767's on it.  I can only imagine the fun we're going to have sitting on that patio when the whole gang is there (which will happen around the 4th of July). We have a big gang.  It's a gang that needs a big patio.

It's not just the water that brings us all together in that place; it's the shared family memories that have been made there--not just for my husband's generation, but for our boys and their many Pearl cousins.

Yes, it's really family that makes this spot special.  But the fact that it's by the water doesn't hurt one bit.

Now swim on over to Cari's.  The water's fine!