HornedToad of Simmer

We made it to the Lake by 2, and parked ourselves at the edge of the habitable beach zone by the Beach House, instead of hiking on northwards up the shore, as we normally do, because the water is so high that you can't. There's no beach to walk on. The red flags were up, the waves were crashing, and the sun was blasting from the sky. We sat in our folding camp chairs. I was still cranky because it was HOT and TOO SUNNY. And I was still wearing my clothes. When I was young, this, to me, was the very epitome of being an oldster: sitting in a folding chair, still fully clothed, reading some huge brick of a book. "What is wrong with these people?" I would say to myself. "Why don't they sit on the sand and make contact? Why don't they at least put on a bathing suit? And take your heads out of your stupid books!" Now I'm one of them. Oh woe. Then the Sparrowhawk brought the big umbrella from the car, and with the aid of some shade, everything immediately got better. When the red flag is up, you're not supposed to swim, but we've done it anyway, 100 times--because usually we swim way down the beach where there are no red flags to be seen. And of course, lots of other people were going in the water, because that's how they roll up here. And every week or so, someone gets drowned, alas. But not us. Anyway, we finally changed into our suits and plunged into the water, just as the red flag was replaced by yellow, so that was okay. The water was very churned up and full of debris near shore, but a lovely temperature and nice rocking waves, so we swam for a pretty long time.

Then we went back to the motel and changed into something less damp and sandy, and walked into town to get food. Then we sat on the veranda and watched the sun sink into a cloudbank in streaks of gold, and enjoyed the evening breeze. At 10 pm, it was dusky, but not really dark yet. The day is so long out here on the very edge of the time zone. During the winter, you forget, and think these days will never come again, and then when they do, you're amazed all over again. We are definitely sunburned. I always try to not let that happen on the first day, but it usually does.