Weekends in Baldwin

A few days ago I wrote about how Ken and I met.  It was on a rafting trip down the Pere Marquette River in Baldwin, Michigan.  In that post I mentioned that my family owned a lot on a little two track dirt road.  On that parcel of land sat a couple of trailers.  Well, I found some old pictures from when we were either dating or just married.  In either case, these are from the 1990s, either early or mid-decade.

This was at a time in our lives when money was tight and our vacation options were limited.  Often, we'd drive up to the trailer and stay for the weekend because it was the cheapest getaway we could manage.  The only thing we had to worry about other than food and gas money was refilling the propane tank before we left and, perhaps once or twice a year, handing over a small amount of money to help cover the electricity bill. It was vacationing on a budget for sure!

At the time this picture was taken I'm fairly confident the trailer had a working bathroom in it.  However, if you look in the woods to the far right, you'll see a small wooden structure.  That's the old outhouse I used to have to use as a kid.  Furthermore, through those woods, behind the outhouse and just a little more to the right there was an old red house with a pump-handle well where we used to wash our hair.  It was like dunking your head in Lake Superior.  Ice cold!  I'd get a headache within seconds and by the time the suds were rinsed out of my hair, I was in a great deal of pain. Brain freeze on a whole different level!

This picture tells me that the old silver camper was long gone.  The shed had been built by this time, which I take as further proof this was taken in the 90s.

Also, can you see the sandy two-track road running through the background?  I can't tell you how many times I traversed that path with my cousins when I was younger.  We'd often go off in search of broken glass we could paint with nail polish.  Yes, kids, that's how mom entertained herself as a child.  I painted pieces of broken glass found along abandoned foundations embedded at the edges of the encroaching woods with nail polish.  What can I say?  It was something to do...

When these pictures were taken I was more likely to be found with a book in my hand instead of one of my aunt's nail polish bottles. 

Also, who just leaves a door wide open?  Hello, mosquitoes!  Come on in and prepare yourself for a midnight feast.  We'll be along eventually.

In true Ken and Krista fashion, I'm reading and Ken is cooking.  As I look at the stuff on the table before him, I'm wondering if he wasn't getting prepping goose roll-ups.  That could be goose or duck meat in the dish.  There's a box of toothpicks.  Bacon.  Seasoned salt.  Yep, I'm thinking goose roll ups for sure.

That structure in the background belonged to a neighbor if you're wondering.  That's not the shed.  The shed is more or less in front of Ken, just out of the shot.

I don't see anyone else in these pictures so I have to think that Ken and I were alone for the weekend.  It seems strange now that we were so often alone, just the two of us.  We don't do a lot by ourselves anymore.  There's always the kids to think of and, if they don't want to join us, we're often with friends or family members.  Alone time is something we don't indulge in the way we used to, at least not very often.  As I think back on this summer's camping trips, I think we camped by ourselves, truly by ourselves with no friends or family a stone's throw away, perhaps two or three times. 

As our kids get older and we're forced to contemplate the empty nest, I wonder if we'll slip back into these moments as easily as we embraced them as a young couple.  I like to think we will.