July 16, 2011

Summer afternoon jam session

My brother on the guitar

The lifestyle at my parents’ camp is simple, monastic even. They’ve got a small cabin, and the rest of us bring tents. They’ve got a couple of picnic tables, an outhouse, a fire pit, and a dock. There's a field where we can play bocce or ladder toss, and some horseshoe pits, and a hammock under the oak trees. It’s pretty much all we need. To create a peaceful atmosphere where we can hear birdsong and the wind rushing through the cattails, my parents have decreed that family members leave behind radios, televisions, computers, and anything that makes noise.

Of course, that rule does not include musical instruments. We’ve always had live music at camp. Shaggy Hair Boy and my father jam together every Wednesday at home: they are sixty years apart, but a love of jazz means they’ve got a whole lot of music in common. They both looked forward to the week at camp when they could play together every day.

Shaggy Hair Boy couldn’t bring a piano to camp, but he managed to fit a battery-powered keyboard into the car. My father plays a bunch of instruments, but he brought the clarinet to camp because it’s the lightest. My brother joined them on guitar, and the trio set up every afternoon after we came back from swimming to play some numbers while the rest of us ate snacks and planned supper.

Camp music

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

That sounds like fun.

Zhoen said...

Sounds like heaven.

Mary Stebbins Taitt said...

So wonderful. Wish I could be there to witness--see, hear, participate. So idyllic and wonderful

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Lomagirl said...

As usual, I wish I were there. Well, these days I wish I were anywhere but here in Hotsville, but your family always sounds so fun, too.