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The Tactics of Summer

By Anneliese Woolford

”Come on, hurry up!”

My uncle’s brown station wagon had barely pulled into the driveway as the back door flung open and I ran out. No child safety locks for me, I was in Point Roberts and nothing was holding me back.

The familiar smell of wild flowers engulfed the air as I rushed past the traditional English garden always well kept at the front of the house. I could hear and see the bumblebees swarming around the gate. Had it been a year or two earlier, I would have begged my dad to go through the gate with me, the bees almost sensing his arrival and parting the way. Now that I was older, I swung open the heavy wooden gate, forgetting my fear of bee stings. I had waited all winter for the magical world adjacent to the gate of my aunt and uncle’s house.

Jackie was where she was every summer, waiting on the beach for my arrival. My aunt explained Jackie’s relationship to me one time over lunch. I couldn’t remember if she was a distant cousin or a friend of the family’s, all that mattered was that we were inseparable for those two weeks each year.
Another gate blocked my path to the beach, yet this one was shorter and susceptible to hopping over. Pieces of shell cracked beneath my tennis shoes as I scrambled to gain my balance in the sand and make my way over to Jackie. After hugs and stories of the past year, we immediately began planning tactics for the one true thing each summer, fort building.

This was no indoor play fort constructed of pillows and blankets – we were pros in the architectural world of beach forts. Not only did we have to design and maintain an acceptable fort, we were also in competition with the boys next door. “Anneliese, hurry! We have to get going, the boys have already started!” Jackie pointed to a few splintered logs standing upright in the sand nearby.

We rolled up our jeans and waded in the salty water collecting logs sizes bigger than ourselves as they drifted into shore. Discussing which design to utilize this year, we cleared a spot just short of the water line during high tide. Myself, being the perfectionist that I am, tried to remove each chip of shell from our fort floor, smoothing over the sand only to find more shells lying beneath.

Our backs were aching as we desperately tried to secure each of the base logs into place, measuring the length of each to match its neighbors. The gray sky hung low over the ocean, sunlight poking through at any given moment.

A particular English accent pierced through the air, sailing over the gate that blocked Jackie and I from the luxury of the plush house; my aunt was calling us for lunch.

Amidst our ham sandwiches, Jackie glanced out the picture window to see two figures surrounding our fort. The kitchen seats never scooted so quickly across the linoleum as we dashed out the kitchen door, down the steps, and into the faces of the cootie-ridden boys who lived next door.

After exchanging some words through gritted teeth, Jackie and I continued with our fort and the boys a few yards away with theirs. Here and there, I would look up and into the eyes of one of their sweaty, envious faces peeking at our format. It was apparent that we had a better layout, as the boys often tore down sections of their fort to mimic ours. The thought of approaching them and causing a scene seemed pointless to me though, and I would only be wasting precious time.

Hours passed as we added logs here, and removed others there. The most time was spent on the roof, trying to make it as sturdy as possible so that the night winds off the Pacific wouldn’t ruin our masterpiece. A mixture of sand and water seeped through the cracks between the logs serving as a small contribution in attempt to seal the inside from the fishy smell outside.

A whole day was spent on our fort; breaks were taken only to eat meals, and an occasional swim in the pool to soothe our strained bodies. Each night brought minor damage to our creation, yet it was always fixable.

The two forts stood looming on the Point Roberts beach for two weeks each summer while we were there. They served as a reminder of our hard work and still hold wonderful childhood memories of summers in Washington at my aunt and uncle’s. Jackie and I tore down each fort that we built the day before the first of us had to leave. It wasn’t the same with the other absent, and we didn’t want anyone playing in them while we were away.

Each time I return to Point Roberts, I look at pictures of our silly looking log creations varying from year to year. I don’t build forts anymore, but perhaps again sometime to tribute my childhood past.

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