Prompt 2 Week 12: My Summer Vacation

                School had just ended for the summer and I should have been excited for long, lazy days in the sun and adventures with my friends but I wasn’t. Instead of hanging out every day with my best friend Katie who only lived five houses away, I was being sent to Kentucky to visit my father, the land of slow-speaking southerners and fried everything. So what if I was being judgmental? Even though I had never been there, I knew I would hate it. I was determined to hate it.

                My brother Zak and I stepped off the plane and our designated travelling companion (babysitter) guided us into the airport where our father was waiting, all smiles in his bright blue wind-pants and Wildcats tee, hat on backwards. Standing at most 5’ 7”, he looked like a wannabe baller without any game.

                “Hey baby,” he drawled, giving me a hug. “I missed you.”

                I cringed as his accent rang in my ears and quickly pulled away. “My name is Sam,” I said.

                “Well you’ll always be my baby,” he replied and I gave up, giving him a point this time. I wasn’t sure I was going to make it through the whole summer, especially if he continued to insist on giving insidious nicknames. I hated being called baby. He gave me a name for a reason, I felt like he should use it, but what did I know?

                Collecting our luggage took forever but nobody noticed except for me. My brother, for some unexplainable reason, loved Kentucky and chattered away about track, bragging about the school record he broke for fastest 100 meter sprint.  After our suitcases finally came out, Dad said “Ready?”

                “That’s not everything,” I said.

                He looked around, taking in my two huge green suitcases, Zak’s duffel bag, and our L.L. Bean backpacks. “There’s more?”

                “Just one more thing,” I said. “We can’t forget Millie.”

                “Millie?” he asked.

                “The. DOG.” Duh.

                His face said it all, and even at ten I was perceptive enough to know my mother hadn’t told him about the dog. I smiled brightly. “So cute! You’ll love her.”

                I was right. He did love her and Millie loved him. We lived in an apartment complex with a huge parking lot filled with cars and a grassy area with picnic tables. Each apartment had a sliding glass door in the rear bedroom that led to a small BBQ area and a small square of lawn. The grass was yellow and brittle, too spiky to walk on with bare feet. The excruciating heat from the sun beamed down on it every afternoon and between the hours of ten and seven it was best to stay inside or risk dying from heat stroke. I was a Maine girl and anything past sixty-five was hot, eighty was too hot and the heat of a Kentucky summer was unbearable. The thick humidity in the air clung to my lungs, stifling my breath. I couldn’t get enough water and thought people were crazy when they bundled up in sweatshirts and jeans at night.

                Millie loved to run in the parking lot; the heat never bothered her. She ran in circles every morning before she settled down to do her business on the lawn. One day, Millie saw my father in the kitchen with her bag of pebbles. So excited, she ran at top speed into the glass door and her thick, little pug body bounced of the glass. From that day on, he loved that dog.

                My father worked every day and since it was too hot to go outside, I became a sports fanatic. The Olympics were on that year and they were in the United States. Atlanta. I was hooked, awed by the speed of the track and field athletes, mesmerized by the dangerous moves of the gymnasts. My brother and I fought over the television as we lounged in the air-conditioned apartment. Who knew I’d ever prefer to spend my summer vacation inside?

                No matter where we went, it seemed like every girl was blonde with tight curls and a face full of makeup. They wore dresses during the day; they were tan, and beautiful. It was like being face-to-face with real, live Barbie dolls every single day. I had never seen anything like it and I secretly made fun of them in my head, wondering how long it took them to make themselves look so perfect and I faithfully reported my adventures (if you consider sitting inside an apartment day after day and occasionally going to Kroger an adventure) in letters to Katie who always promptly responded with disbelief and sympathy for my waste of a vacation.

                Our biggest excitement that summer was Church Camp; shockingly, it was fun in a twilight zone sort of way. The people at camp were like aliens to me, the strict Catholic girl I was, who gave up chocolate for Lent and went to church on Christmas Eve and Easter. Wesleyans, they sang and danced and did arts and crafts. They rejoiced in their love for God and faithfully went to church not only on Sundays but on Wednesdays as well. They placed their entire well-being in His hands, content with whatever happened because “things always happen for a reason.” They were always happy and robot-like. I had never seen anything like it, never seen people so passionate about anything, much less God. They kind of creeped me out.       

                It was a whole other world down there, in the south where slimy okra was a dinnertime staple. I figured the heat must have made it difficult for people to think clearly, prohibiting them from speaking in grammatically correct sentences or moving faster than the turtle I rescued earlier that year. People were reserved, women upheld a feminine stereotype that was lost in the seventies, and the only thing that got them excited was God. Me, raised in a liberal family, Catholic, didn’t fit there. I couldn’t wait to go home, where people knew what a red hot dog was or even a whoopee pie, to normal temperatures that allowed me to go outside.