notes & things | 8/18/2025
The past couple of days have been waterlogged, both here in the city and up in Wisconsin, where I spent some time amongst the gentle rolling hills and fields of corn up in old stomping grounds from childhood, including a family picnic with cousins and such in the same campground that housed summer trailers that belonged to my grandmother and an aunt & uncle (and now my cousin.) The views from their deck look out over the lake, which was topped by dark and looming clouds that dropped an excessive amount of rain over sheltered gathering not just once, but twice. It's strange how memory works, superimposing the present over the past..so many of the old bones of the campground are still there. The shelter/rec room we were in once was a dark building inhabited by bats we'd been warned against. The playground that once harbored a sandy playground made from tires and a fallen tree trunk engraved with grafitti now harbored kid safe rubber playground equipment. The bathrooms that once had me captively watching my older cousins put egg yolks and beer in their hair to make it shine in the late 70s as they spent what felt like hours applying makeup. Since my grandmother died when I was six, these memories are more in snippets than other, more solid, later ones. My visits since have always been brief, like picking up family on the way further north. The campground is a lot larger and denser than it once was back in the late 70s/early 80s, but it still feels exactly the same as it did more than four decades ago.
I did convince J to a trip over to the ferry, which is close to where were staying on the side we were on, but involved about a half hour drive to get to the other side to make our way back across (there are not many bridges outside the highway besides the ferry, so you have to make a trek the long way around.) It too felt the same with its ice cream depots on either side and gorgeous views of what once was woods but are now groupings of bougie lakefront houses. The line of cars waiting at the dock was shorter than I remember, but it was a Friday night at dusk vs. daytime crossings we used to do on long car rides. I get these glimmers of the past and they are enjoyable but also tinged by a deep sadness and nostalgia., kind of like the underwater cables that pull that same ferry along its course. Not noticeable at all times, but there nonetheless.
The landscape, though, kills me in other ways. That swooping sky, those sloping hills dotted with cattle punctuated by occasional fields with like 20 deer in them.. You're far enough north that you've lost the mundane flatness of Illinois, but haven't yet reached the deep forests further north. It is also sparsely populated away from the waterfront, with small towns that are just a gas station and a fast food joint suddenly appearing out of nowhere. I always find myself thinking I could live in that landscape, but winters are brutal. It's a summer place, and maybe a nice visit in the fall, but I can't even imagine navigating those charming twisting and steep roads in icy weather.
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