October 2003 Issue - Essay # 7
Frozen
Dreams
By Diane Payne
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After
putting the hot chocolate packages, marshmallows, cook stove, and
matches in a knapsack, we piled on our winter clothes and skied to the
beach. The sun had
finally come out and we felt like explorers in the North Pole, though we
were only in Both
Terri and I wished we could swap homes.
She wanted to be within walking distance of the library and I
longed to be near the beach. But on this wintry day, the best homes
seemed to be these deserted cottages.
"I'd
live in this cottage all year if I owned it," I said pointing to an
old three story house. "Maybe
we'll be famous writers when we're older and one of these big cottages
will be ours." "You
think we'll ever be rich, Terri?" "I
will be." We
skied on in silence, both lost in our private thoughts until reaching a
clearing overlooking the lake. "It's beautiful!" I screamed.
Ten
foot waves frozen solid just as they were breaking against the shore.
Nothing but icebergs for miles up and down the shore. "My
dad's fishing boat is stuck out there," Terri said pointing at "When
do you think he'll be back?" "When
the ice melts, unless the Coast Guard finds a way to haul them to shore
in My
dad worked at a factory -- punch in, punch out, come home grumpy.
Terri's dad and his fishermen friends hung out in the fish shed
drinking beer. During the
warm months, I'd ride my
bike to her house, hoping I'd
be invited to go out on the fishing boat. "They
like fishing to get away from their wives," Terri said.
"Even
I don't get to go out with them. It's
a guy thing."
"Wouldn't
it be fun if we had an all-girl fishing boat?" "I
don't want to fish. I'd
rather work in a factory." We
skied down the dune to the beach. Everything looked so foreign. Seemed
like the people climbing the dunes could have been explorers on Mars.
We propped our skis in the snow and joined the others walking on
the frozen ice, but walking
just a little further out than the rest.
We were certain this thick ice wouldn't break. "Here's
a good spot out of the wind," Terri decided. The
sun was starting to set while we heated the water in a pan.
Both of us kept our hands over the flame, thawing out our fingers
while the temperature dropped with the
disappearing sun. "One
of these days I'm going to walk around the entire lake, Terri." "Why?" "Just
to do it. I want to see the
people who live in "There
are channels you'd have to get across, just like the one over there by
the lighthouse." "I
could swim them." "Maybe.
I'd rather move to "That
seems so far away." "That's
why," Terri laughed. She
was one year older and seemed to know way more than me. It would take me
awhile to find Sitting
on the iceberg, we drank our hot chocolate watching the people leave the
beach, wondering where we'd live, which places we'd visit, and what
famous books we'd write.
Before
skiing home, we looked for Terri's dad's fishing boat, but
saw nothing except frozen water blending into the gray sky;
nothing but icebergs, nothing but dreams.
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Author's Biography Diane lives in Monticello, Arkansas, far away from her hometown near Lake Michigan. |
Essay
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