Reflections on Sage Lake

Reflections On Sage Lake

Joy Rick Atkins

Copyright © 2006 by Joy Rick Atkins.

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Contents

Chapter 1

A Fairy Tale

Chapter 2

The Saga of Henry Sage

Chapter 3

How Sage’s Lake Became our Sage

Chapter 4

The Early Years

Chapter 5

The Lake: Facts, Figures and More

Chapter 6

The Ups and Downs of Summer Cottages

Chapter 7

The Middle Years

Chapter 8

Wild Things

Chapter 9

Cruising the Lake

Chapter 10

The Empty Years

Chapter 11

The Remodeling Years

Chapter 12

The Changing Years

Chapter 13

The Long Mile

Chapter 14

Knotty Pine Nonsense

Chapter 15

Under the Lilac Bush

Chapter 16

Games, Games and More Games

Chapter 17

Our Grandchildren Remember

Chapter 18

Comings and Goings

A special thank you to my daughter Nancy

for her many valuable suggestions.

To

Sid and Grace

who made it possible

and

Martin

Peter Nancy Craig

Angela Kyle Adam Ben Andy Matt

who made it all happen

Summer at Sage Lake

Sage Lake in summer ripples

under sunny skies, sparkles

in her sequined party shawl,

plays host when evening falls

to a pair of Canada geese

who drop in unexpectedly.

Yet Sage Lake suffers visibly

when cold northern winds

rage upon her limpid surface

like some jealous husband

abusing his cringing spouse.

                                 Still she knows,

as does a battered mate,

that such demeaning torture

will abate with nightfall,

when cruel winds become

a gentle breeze,

cradling bruised waters,

appeased, contrite.

      Joy Rick Atkins, 1997

Chapter 1

A Fairy Tale

In the world of literature, when someone makes a wish, over and over for a long time, and the wish is finally granted it is called a fairy tale.

When I was a child there were so many things I wanted to do or become when I grew up that I would have to live to be two hundred to attain them all. I wanted to read all the books in the public library, visit all the countries in the world, be a trapeze artist in a famous circus, become an anthropologist, a social worker, an attorney for the downtrodden, marry and have a family, live in the country, own horses, save and collect stray animals, write a book, and own a cottage on a lake. I’m still working hard on the first, long ago gave up on the next five, but have accomplished the last six. As the old saying goes, six out of twelve ain’t bad!

All of which proves if you dream enough dreams, fairy tales can come true. This book is about one of mine that did.

Michigan is blessed with many lakes. It’s impossible to live anywhere in the state without finding one close by. Where I grew up in Hillsdale, in southern Michigan, we were not only surrounded by lakes, but also by cottages and their lucky owners. As a small child I remember begging my mother to drive my brother and me to nearby Baw Beese Lake to swim on hot summer afternoons. Always there were cottagers to envy. They could look out their windows every morning and see the beckoning lake at their doorsteps, and they could swim whenever they wished. Cottagers were very lucky people.

As a teenager I rode my balloon tired bike over seven miles of bumpy gravel roads to Wilson Lake to swim. Because I so loved the water, I would sometimes swim out toward the middle of the lake, roll over on my back, kick my feet every now and then to keep my balance, and gaze up at the cottony summer clouds drifting in a bright blue sky. Of course I never told my parents as they would have surely disapproved, but I felt safe as there were few power boats to worry about and certainly no jet skis, and always I was looking for places to be by myself. What did my teenage self dream about as she floated serenely on her back gazing skyward? Did she envision herself famous, or in love, or did she see herself soaring above those clouds in a plane taking her to exotic places all over the world?

Once, and only once, two girl friends wanted to go with me, but they didn’t have bikes. We started early in the morning to walk the seven miles, spending most of the day swimming and sunning, then home again singing crazy songs such as there were 49 green bottles sitting on the wall. If one of those green bottles should chance to take a fall, there’d be 48 green bottles sitting on the wall— and so on over and over, to make the walk less painful. I still sometimes find myself, while walking, listening in my head to those annoying words, which bring back memories of that hot muggy walk home so many years ago.

I don’t know where my early love of lakes and cottages came from. It’s not as though I never had the opportunity to swim in lakes or even to stay in cottages. But renting a cottage, as my parents frequently did, can’t make you a cottager. I wanted to feel at home in a cottage. And how could I, when the pots and pans, plates and glasses, had all been used by other renters just before we took up residence, and would be used by still others once our occupancy ended? Renting a cottage for a week or two served only to give me a tantalizing taste of what actually living in a cottage of my own would be like.

There was one cottage, however, that almost became what I imagined ownership would be like. One summer, when I was around eight, my dad rented a log cabin on Sand Lake for two weeks. I’ll never forget how thrilled I was when I first beheld that cabin. What could possibly be more wonderful than living in a log cabin ON A LAKE! We had our little fox terrier, Pal, with us, along with our big white rabbit, Peter. My dad promptly build a small fenced in area attached to the side of the cottage for Peter to stay in, a project that made it seem all the more like permanence. As if the cabin itself were not enough, imagine my thrill upon discovering I had to climb a ladder to reach the bunk beds on an open area second story! Now that was really living!

To reach the warm sandy beach we had only to cross a narrow gravel road and there we were, with the water enticing us as it leisurely lapped the shore.

Although I never forgot the cottage or the lake, I had no idea where in Michigan they were located. In fact I believe there are several Sand Lakes in our state. Then one warm summer day, (decades later and cottage ownership long a reality) during a drive to Tawas to spend the afternoon on the beach, I happened to notice a sign reading Sand Lake pointing to a road north of highway 55. I knew immediately I had found my wonderful lake and perhaps my loved log cabin. Nothing would do but for me to follow my yellow brick road to search for that beloved childhood cabin and lake.

What makes you think your log cabin is still standing after all these years? my prosaic husband asked.

What makes you think it won’t be? I challenged. He had to agree it was possible. We found several somewhat derelict log cabins, but only one or two that might possibly be the one I had so long remembered. In each case there was the narrow dirt road directly in front with the sandy beach beyond. I was nostalgic for several days to come.

Yet the story doesn’t end here. Just a few months ago I was cleaning a bookcase when a yellowed crumpled post card fell from a favorite childhood book. It had a picture of Sand Lake on the front and a number of penciled words on the back in a child’s imperfect sprawl. It was a card to be sent to my favorite cousin and best friend, but for some reason it had never been mailed. Dear Phyllis, it read. Here is the lake where we are staying. I swim every day. It’s all sandy and lots of fun. We live in a log cabin right on the lake. Wish you were here. Your cousin Joy. The card had a Hale, Michigan, postmark.

I carefully replaced the card inside the book for safe keeping. Why was it never mailed, and why had it been saved and placed in that particular book? It seemed no coincidence to me that my young self and my now old self should have walked the streets of Hale so many years apart. It appeared almost prophetic that those two favorite cottages were only a few miles from one another, and that I should finally make the discovery. It’s nice to know that my young self, and my old self, and all my selves during the many long years between, were true to one another in their love of lakes, cottages, wild life, and all that northern Michigan has to offer. As for my dream of someday owning a cottage, here’s where it all began.

Marty and I met in the fall of 1941 at Hillsdale College. Although our relationship took some time to develop, once it caught fire there was no stopping it. After Pearl Harbor, Marty and other college students were allowed to graduate before being drafted into the army. Shortly after his graduation the army beckoned. We were married in Mineral Wells, Texas, where he was stationed at Camp Wolters for his basic training. From there he was sent to Europe within a few weeks of our marriage. I finished college while he was gone.

Upon his return we had a year of further schooling at St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York. The following fall we accepted teaching positions in North Branch, Michigan, and two years later in Carson City, Michigan. It was during our first year in Carson City that I became pregnant with our oldest child Peter. That ended my teaching career for a time. Almost four years later his sister Nancy was born. Even though Marty was by now superintendent of schools in Carson City, things were very tight financially and it was all we could do just making mortgage payments toward the big old house we had purchased, plus paying our monthly bills. I remember a time when we had our milk delivery cut off because we hadn’t, and couldn’t pay our bill. Another time I searched for a cheap chest of drawers for one of the children, and had to pay it off each month ten dollars at a time.

Our favorite form of entertainment came from taking our two young children to nearby Crystal Lake to swim and play on the sandy public beach. We had discovered early in our marriage that we both had this lifelong dream of some day owning a cottage. After every swim we would spend a few minutes driving around the roads surrounding the lake, envying all the people who owned summer cottages. We would watch them mowing their tiny lawns and caring for their small flower beds behind their cozy lakefront homes. Even a beach towel hanging on a makeshift clothesline was cause for envy.

Then, in August, 1956, when Peter was five and Nancy eighteen months, we had a surprise visit one Sunday evening from Marty’s parents who lived in Saginaw. Although I was usually glad to see them, this time I was a little irritated with their timing. It was bath and bedtime for my two tired children. It must be noted here that Grace and I had a relationship that somewhat resembled the one Ray Romono’s wife, Debra, had with her mother-in-law, Marie.

Grace was finding it difficult to share her only child, which had resulted in our relationship being fraught with veiled friction. Short, cocky, extroverted Sid and I, however, got along great.

From the moment they arrived that night