Saturday, July 5 (NH)

Our final day in NH. We started off the day with a second river rafting trip, taking two rafts this time with Andrew's sister's family plus aunt and uncle. The water was very shallow and slow, but it was a beautiful day, and Andrew and the girls and I stopped twice to hunt for river glass. It wasn't a very nice swimming day, since the slow water meant there were lots of tiny flies that adhered to skin and swimsuits; the volume of them was actually very alarming. Lucia did swim for a while while we were rafting, in an area where there weren't many flies. We saw a bald eagle and a cute family of brown-headed ducks.

Then it was time to unwind our NH stay: deflating all the inflatables, taking down the pond rope, taking down the swing and hammocks, packing up, cleaning out the fridge. It was all very very sad. Andrew, the kids, and I squeezed in a hike through the woods. Andrew's aunt and uncle brought over Pizza Chef pizzas for dinner, and then we loaded up the car and started emptying trash, etc. We did find time for one final game of Rummikub (Greta won).

Usually, around the two-week mark of our summer stay, I feel very ready to leave and return to the comforts of non-farmhouse life. Not this year. I am very sad to leave. This time in NH was a light at the end of the tunnel during the darkest days of this year, and it delivered on its promise to serve as a reset after the foundation-shifting months that made up the first quarter of 2025. We've spent sixteen years building our family traditions and routines for NH, which all four of us count on and look forward to. Each one is a vital part of our family's summer story--the river rafting trip, the hike to the top of Mount Ascutney, strawberry picking, maple creamees, Books-A-Million, the creek, the pond, walking in the woods, reading in hammocks, playing games, the 4th of July in Plainfield. 

The time here connects and steadies us, and this year it especially steadied me. I needed this trip so much. I needed to sit by the pond and listen to the kids laughing. I needed to lie in my hammock in the woods and look at the trees above me shivering in the breeze. I needed to sit around the kitchen table and play a tense, silent game of Chinese checkers, Andrew and the girls all rooting against me since I always win. I needed this time. I needed the traditions and routines. It seems like a miracle: life here is the same as it always has been. And look: there I am, different now but still me, walking along the gravel road. I feel like I can finally breathe again.