Silver Linings

The back is on the mend. I wanted badly to get in the kayak and head out but that would have been dumb…and Pam would have been furious with me if I did. Instead, I stayed around the dock with Lucy while she went out. However, in Maine you don’t really need to leave the dock to catch fish…

It must be said that Miss Lucy is in mid-season form already…

It has taken Pam a bit longer to hit her stride. It might have something to do with the fact that she has been working like a beast since my back went out, picking up my slack. But this was a good sign…

That’s her out there with her kayak tied to the swim float reading a book. 

So, last night something crazy happened. We were both busy cooking dinner, Pam in the kitchen, me out on the grill. It was one of our favorite camp meals, chicken kabobs with peanut sauce. We sat down at the table and slathered the sauce on everything, then said the blessing, thanking God for the privilege of being in such a place for six weeks. Then we both shoveled the first delectable bite into our mouths only to be shocked by a horrible discovery. I looked at her. She looked at me, mouths closed, our faces contorted in painful grimaces. Apparently, that container of sugar from which Pam had taken a third of a cup to mix with the peanut sauce was…SALT. In 38 years of marriage, this was a first. The dinner that had smelled so delicious while it was cooking was now ruined. Then Pam—in the first sign that she is rounding into ideal Maine shape—says to me, “Well, I guess this means we have no choice but to go get ice cream.”

A valuable lesson was learned which is that the secret to guilt-free ice cream consumption is destroying dinner. Silver linings.

This morning, for the first time since we arrived on Saturday, the lake is still…