 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
||||||
 |
 |
|||||
 |
||||||
 |
 |
 |
||||
 |
 |
|||||
 |
||||||
 |
 |
|||||
 |
||||||
 |
||||||
 |
||||||
 |
 |
|||||
 |
||||||
Cabin Relations
Midwest Home, September 2005
© 2005 by Greg Breining
Our place sits on Eagle Lake, 30 miles northeast of Brainerd. I was 3 when my dad and uncle built it in 1956. I still remember how a pile of rocks took shape as a chimney, and new two-by-fours became walls and a roof.
Most every summer weekend, my dad, mom, and baby brother would drive north. In our home away from home, we pumped water by hand and played cards by the glare of a gas lantern. Only later did we install electricity and, sometime after, indoor plumbing.
At the cabin I learned most of the outdoor skills I can claim—to shoot a gun, paddle a canoe, and fish. At daybreak Dad and I would head out in a rowboat on a lake smothered by fog. The first few minutes were magic. Herons waded the shallows. Loons yodeled. Our reels whirred as lures sailed in tall arcs. The lake was ours. But soon, an outboard started somewhere on the lake, the sun rose over the trees, and the spell, like the fog, evaporated.
Though I loved the place, I never quite imagined owning it. Or any other cabin. As an adult, I was more preoccupied with kayaking, camping, and traveling. A cabin tied you down. I had trouble justifying the impact of two homes—to the pocketbook and to lakes and woodlands better used by fish and wildlife.
I had never been able to talk with my father about the day when he would not want to care for the cabin. And I couldn't figure out how to split responsibilities with my brother, whom I loved but for years had felt distant from. So I simply imagined the cabin would somehow stay in the family forever.
Then, three years ago, as Mom vanished into the fog of dementia and Parkinson's, Dad decided he didn't want to sit at the cabin alone. My brother and wife lived out of state and couldn't use the place. Dad decided to sell and Susan (then my girlfriend) and I had enough money to buy.
Now what? One moment I was excited; the next, anxious. Here was a chance to make the place in our own image. But would it take away our summers? Drive us to the poorhouse? Should we rent it to justify the expense? Or perhaps even live in it year-round? Another cabin owner once told me, "I realized I constructed something I now had to have a relationship with." Exactly! But what kind of relationship? An overnight fling? Long marriage? Ongoing affair?
The first summer seemed more like simple slavery. Mom and Dad had let the place run down. With a bit of denial and a lot of bug bomb, they overlooked the insects and dampness.
But Susan and I saw our cabin anew. We heard tapping and realized carpenter ants were emerging from a hidden crevice by the hundreds, flying across the living room, and smacking into the picture window.
Out came the ceiling, rotted wood, and ant colony. In went better lighting, an overhead fan, insulation, and new ceiling. We ripped out carpet, laid down a vapor barrier, and installed new flooring. Despite a nearly new roof, each rainstorm sent a gusher through the weathered masonry of the stone chimney. I chiseled out mortar, lugged 30-pound loads of concrete up a ladder, and filled the cracks.
How could my father let the place go? I felt angry, then disdainful, and finally smug. All this, I came to realize, was childish rage, my old battle with his voice in my head. Truth is, had someone without my sentimental attachment bought the land, he might have bulldozed the cabin and built in its place a new home with two-and-a-half baths and a great room with furniture from Silver Creek Traders. Why fix a teardown? No wonder my parents made do. Had I been their age, that first summer would have killed me.
Finally, however, our cabin is tight against the weather and most of God's creatures. Susan and I together explore our relationship with this place. We continue to ask questions. How does this cabin fit our lives? How should we spend our time?
Slowly we find answers. Like Dad, I get satisfaction in working (though I can wait years before tuck pointing another chimney). Susan snorkels and fly-fishes for bluegills. We find our favorite season is autumn, when we tramp the woods for grouse and pick mushrooms and cranberries. The year after our renovation, we were married, and our cabin filled with friends and family.
A cabin, we discover, is an investment, not so much of money as spirit. It defines your seasons, and as I have learned in looking back, also your life and family.