A Cabin By The Lake

Today is Hannah’s birthday and we’re all camping at Bass Lake. We go camping every year, and sometimes I come along too. It’s a long drive most of the time, but this time I live at home, so it was less of a decision this year and more of a subconscious dragging from one place of residence to the other. I’m the black sheep of the family, except I’m pale white and sunburn really easily. I’m the white and sometimes bright red sheep of the family

It’s not that I don’t love my family, because I clearly do. They’re my only link to this world when I don’t know how to make sense of my life. Sometimes though, sometimes I think that maybe I’m a white and sometimes bright red sheep in a family of Llamas, or perhaps mountain lions. Maybe… deer? I don’t know, as long as it’s something un-insulting. I just feel like we’re different.

Timmy and Hannah keep talking about surfing with Nate and Tabs. (those two seem more like they belong than me) and everybody keeps jamming along to Kesha or Kiesha (don’t really know how that’s spelled) whist quoting lines from movies about sports.

Hey, do you guys think that this could be the lake where they filmed Bethoven? That would be Soooo awesome!

Oh, my God! I love Beethoven!

I think that was in Beethoven 2…

Everyone lays out in their perfectly stretched out bodies on the beach. I’m in the shade. I’m writing and reading.

Oh, my God, I can’t WAIT to get in the water.

Me too, I am Soooo ready. You have NO idea!

What’s in the backpack?

Books.

You’re carrying around a backpack full of books? This is our vacation. I carry a backpack full of books around when I’m in school.

I like books.

I like sitting and reading. They have to write and read, because they are in school. There is no school at the lake. It’s just a cabin. I should not want to sit on the shore to read and write. I should not like the shade, when I can lie half naked in the sun and talk about the different flavors of peach that Jamba Juice has to offer.

Stephen, aren’t you going to get in the water?

I’ll go when I want to. Why do I have to right now?

I think everyone wants to be in the water right now.

I finally go into the water. Everyone else gets out. I move out of the shade. Everyone wants to get in the car. A herd of Llamas and one brick red Sheep.

Why didn’t you go when everyone else was going? Don’t be mad.

I hate it when people tell me not to be mad when I’m not mad. It just proves the point that I am unable to show how I feel in front of people.

I’m not mad. I’m just not a Llama.

Timmy is driving home. He is strong and muscular. He surfs, and he plays Bass in a rock band. Somehow being an introspective, socially backward home-school kid didn’t transfer over to the whole family. I remember though. He used to pee outside, and watch Star Trek with me and Jon. He used to cry to Mom about everything. He should thank me for those muscles. Jon and I used to fight him. He became strong because he had something to fight against, and he became cool because he had something to prove, something Jon and I gave up on. I had nothing to fight, which is why he can bench press me. We don’t wrestle anymore, but that doesn’t mean that I’m not strong.

You strengthen the muscles that you exercise. They didn’t have to deal with being the backward one in a family of forward moving people. They didn’t ever create the muscle memory to look away and pretend not to notice that everyone is either staring at you or completely ignoring you. I’ve always had either one or the other. I have a savings bond of awkward stares that has matured into the thousands. I keep them all.

It’s not just camping in a cabin by the lake. It’s when people tell you how funny you are, when all else they can talk about is how pretty your sisters are or how strong your brothers are. It’s every time someone asks you how you’re doing and you don’t understand that they don’t really want to know. It’s every note you write to some girl you SWEAR you’re falling in love with, even though she’s already started talking about the man that she’ll eventually leave you for. A real man. He’s funny and good looking. It’s everyone who thinks it will make you feel better to know that there’s no one else in the world like you.

Really. No one. I’ve never met anyone like you and I don’t think I ever will.

I keep them all.