Every summer after
camp, my parents would pick us up and we would go to
Stockbridge, where their old friends Bert and Nora's country house was. They would be there, and
sometimes their youngest son
Teddy, and sometimes some of Teddy's brothers, none of whom I
knew as well as I knew Teddy because they were all much older. I was
still a child and they were young men already. Teddy was just a
couple of years older than Joe, my brother, so he was more accessible.
One year my Aunt Emma and Uncle Richard came
as well. They were all old by then, our elders. Emma and Richard and
Bert and Nora and our parents, Red and Ellie, had all been young
together. Or at least younger. Teddy often likes to say that because
of our parents' connection, we've known each other since before we were
born, which is a pretty nice way to put it.
What I remember
about that visit is sitting out on what was the closest thing to a lawn
in Stockbridge. Nothing was a lawn, because the whole property is in
the woods, perched on a ravine, next to a huge, thick, dark pine
forest. It's damp and mosquitoey and musty. And Red, my father, always says that
when Bert was going to buy that property, Uncle Richard told him not to do
it.
But then everyone was glad that he'd bought it, and we'd
all go there every summer. And that one summer that we were all there
at the same time as Emma and Richard, we were cooking out on the
expanse of ground, as I said, not really a lawn because the ground had that thin sort of grass that grows in and around the woods, with lots of rocky areas completely covered in moss. We were grilling steaks, and inside we
were cooking corn. For some reason, someone began talking about
lobster and how much they loved lobster. And Uncle Richard, who had a
way of making pronouncements, said authoritatively that he liked
lobster as much as the next man, but did we really need to be talking about lobster when we were eating steak? Because steak, after all, said Uncle
Richard, was the king of foods.
Teddy still goes up to
Stockbridge, and so do his brothers -- and their children -- and in
some cases, their grandchildren. Nora and Bert are gone, and so are
Aunt Emma and Uncle Richard, and Ellie, my mother. Red is still with us, but not for much
longer -- and he's far beyond going up to Stockbridge at this point. But we,
Geoff and I, still go, every so often, although we haven't been there
since Geoff mangled his foot at the quarry. But when we go back, this
summer or the next one, surely we'll steam some corn and grill ourselves some steak, the
king of foods.
