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Let me start this Monday by saying that while I do generally keep this diary for myself, if it were SOLELY for my own benefit and edification, I wouldn�t keep it in such a public forum. As such, it�s always nice to hear from the people reading. Niki and Mark, I enjoyed your emails hugely, and am glad you took the time to say hello. You, too, Heather�thanks for signing the guestbook. And yes, 16 thousand dollars is a RIDICULOUS amount of money for food!!!
That said�
Conway was�well, Conway was tough. In lots of ways, time has just stopped up there. I could have walked in to 1984 just as easily as 2001, with just a few minor adjustments. Even the magazines in the outhouse never change. Yes, I said �outhouse.� As in �no indoor plumbing.� Well, there�s a sink, and a shower and a urinal (go figure), but no toilet. But anyway�
The pictures on the wall are the same. The couch upstairs, site of the �Conway Explosion,� is still the same. The sign on the outside, bright red with white letters spelling out �The Ginboru Castle��still the same (Nana was GInny, Papa was BOb, last name was RUsso). The three-wheeled ATV is still in the garage, waiting to be driven through the woods on a firewood-gathering mission.
Some things are different. The stove and refrigerator are gone from the kitchen, having finally gone to appliance heaven. The area across the lake where the platform tents used to be set up, the place my grandfather called �Resurrection� because they�d appear overnight from nothing, the summer home to my summer friends Stacy and Donnie�it�s vacant and for sale, not a tent in sight. The stone fireplace in front of the lake, christened the �Flintstone� when I was little since it looked like it belonged on the cartoon, has been rebuilt, not the one I remember from my childhood. The dilapidated red tent-like structure that was next door has finally been removed, leaving just the base of the foundation and the water pump behind.
And the big differences. Next door, Fee is alone, having outlived his wife (also a Ginny) by several years at this point. Aunt Emma and Uncle Larry, fixtures in my young life at the top of the hill, have both died, leaving the house to their daughter Muriel, who now lives there year-round, carrying on the Conway traditions for her children and grandchildren (although their house, too, is the same and not the same as my memory shows it to be). And the biggest difference�Nana and Papa are gone.
Although they aren�t really. And therein lies the hard part of Conway. They�re in every corner, every space, every acorn and pinecone, every drop of water in the lake. They�re in the dishes I used to set the table for Saturday�s dinner, and the sleeping bag I curled up in next to the Boyfriend Saturday night. The air is so saturated with memories up there, it�s impossible to believe that I won�t round the corner at the bottom of the hill and find her in the kitchen, making donuts in the Fry Daddy, him in the shed, puttering through his woodworking supplies (all still shelved in their properly labeled places).
The Boyfriend loved the place, as I knew he would. He wants to buy the point where Resurrection used to stand, build our own house, create our own safe haven. Part of me thinks that would be a wonderful thing.
The other part of me, the same part that stood below the Ginboru sign and bawled, never wants to go back to Conway again.
I miss my grandparents.
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