A Summer Love

My heart softens when Deborah Kerr in The King and I sings, “Hello Young Lovers” to a group of younger royal wives in the King of Siam’s court. She shares a photograph of her late husband Tom and the wives cannot fathom that a woman as old as Anna would have had such a great love that has sustained her through widowhood. I’ve experienced a Summer Love that I have never ever forgotten. Now my memories are tucked away in a beautiful box. It wasn’t my golden summer, that came later – but I will say that it is my silver star and moon summer that I will write about here.

He was tall and lanky with sunkissed sandy hair that fell below his right eyebrow. Freckles dotted the bridge of his nose and his arms could only be described as sinewy – that oft-quoted adjective used in bodice-ripping romance books. He wore long cut-off jeans and was often barefoot and shirtless. Without dimples but with a wonderful smile, highlighted by two
adorable “parentheses” around the edges of each side of his mouth. I called him my Tom Sawyer boyfriend because he looked just like an illustration in the Mark Twain novel I had in my bookshelf at home. And he had a boat…

It was a banana-yellow two-seater. To this day, I am still shocked that my mother let me go boating with him without much reservation. He was a scout – working towards his Eagle merit and very polite and capable. Still I would not have let my daughter go on a boat at 15 with a boy. Times were informed by different things back then…

In the afternoons, at the golden hour – that glorious yellow sun would start to drop in the west over the little beach. It left sparkles on the sand, on the water, and on my browned skin. I would hop in my seat where his thigh touched mine ever so lightly. I could feel the slight scratch of his hair and always wondered if he could feel my own smooth leg.

The boat rose up on each wave and then crashed down very fast and if one wasn’t careful, they could bite off the tip of their tongue. The one restriction my mother did impose was that we couldn’t leave the harbor for open water. But by this time, the boats were few and far between and only the trawlers and ferries were coming to port. He almost always chased their wakes until I screamed for him to stop.

Soon, he would slow down his pace and I knew that he would soon turn around back toward land. Slowly and gently we cruised to the beach where we had began. We were always breathless with the beauty of the fast boat, the wind in our hair, the tease of that golden light. I couldn’t ever imagine growing old or not being young and free.

I helped him drag his boat to a spot under the beach plums. There we would make it secure and tidy it up. He would then walk me home to supper where there was usually fish and chips or hamburgers on a paper tablecloth at the family picnic table. He carried on to his own home where he spent his nighttime hours on a marvelous sleeping porch in the front of the house. I had all I could do not to walk by it in the middle of the night and catch him dreaming.

We saw each other all summer that year and he was a lovely first Summer Love. We paired off from the other kids around 9 o’clock just when the silver moon and stars hung high above us. We settled our tan legs in front of a large grey stone and whispered soft nothings to each other. We also talked about our future together and whether we would see each other during the cold long winter. Twenty-seven miles and no driver’s licenses threatened to keep us apart. He assured me that he would visit me when he finally got his driver’s license but alas, that was not to be. I also wrote him a few letters but he never wrote back until Christmas Eve when I received a card from him. He told me he was looking forward to seeing me the following summer. I cried for joy but by then others had stolen my attentions..local boys from school who were, well…available.

We had two more encounters, my Tom Sawyer and I. One happened the next summer when I returned to the beach but this time with a new boy. I was told he was hurt. And then I saw him at a friend’s wedding and I was happily married by then. We had a poignant and warm little conversation and a dance. He was still sinewy and handsome with thinner hair which I loved. It didn’t hang over that right eye any longer. But he still had that great open-sandwich smile – the one with the parentheses emphasizing that great smile.

I wrote a short poem about him once in a creative writing class and my instructor had it published in a journal. It’s the first thing I ever published. I think it nicely captured the poignancy of summer love and even first love. As soon as the heat lets up, I will search out that poem and print it here.  Until then, Rodgers and Hammerstein understands…

Don’t cry, young lovers,
Whatever you do,
Don’t cry because I’m alone.
All of my memories are happy tonight,
I’ve had a love of my own.

I’ve had a love of my own,
Like yours,
I’ve had a love of my own.