Labor Day 2015
Is it really 5 a.m.? OK, so it’s really 4:45 a.m. It’s barely light out. Harry is calling us from downstairs. “Barbara, Frank—get up! We’re going water skiing! C’mon, the lake is like GLASS!” My brother, Frank, at cranky age 7, and I at a bit more enthusiastic age 9, didn’t like getting up this early. We slip into bathing suits and shuffle downstairs. We will be in these bathing suits for the rest of the day. It’s summer on the lake. Harry is hot to trot. He’s halfway down the path to the shed; he’s opening up the combination lock and grabbing the stash of water skiing equipment. He’s piling everything on the dock for us to load into the boat. Harry is our older brother. At 26, Harry is a bit older than we are, so we don’t have the usual competitive sibling relationship. Harry is more like a really cool younger uncle who always makes lots of time to share all of his hobbies with Frank and me. From building balsa wood airplanes with Frank to teaching me how to use a camera and make black and white prints in his darkroom, Harry is the one we always want to spend time with and we do. He has cool hobbies, cool cars and even cooler boats. The lake is like glass. There’s a little bit of a mist over the water. The rising sun is so bright it hurts our eyes. Our job is to get the cover off the boat—an acrobatic feat accompanied by some cursing. Frank and I manage to uncover the boat and start loading the water skis, life jackets, ski rope and towels. There’s a gleam in Harry’s eye as he carefully places his prized slalom ski, a Chuck Stearns special, behind the driver’s seat. Harry and his summer buddies loved to water ski. They were professional grade. One summer, they set up a slalom course in our cove, at Nolan’s Point. It consisted of buoys made with Clorox bleach bottles tied to cinderblocks with a length of nylon rope. They were very ingenious. They would set the course out in the morning and practice until the lake got too busy or until all of them got too tired, whichever came first. So, back to our water skiing lessons. The sun is barely up. I am shivering on the boat with the safety belt around my belly—I am too little for the vest that Harry uses. “You going first?” asks Harry.
Today it is my turn. I stand on the edge of the boat and flop into the lake.
Harry has already jumped in and is standing in the water to help me on with my skis and get me set up with the ski rope. I manage to squeak the rubber bindings onto my feet and bobble around clumsily as I try to get into position. Harry’s friend who is driving throws the rope out to us and Harry puts the handle in my hands and whispers a few last-minute instructions in my ear. “Knees up towards your chest, rope handle between your knees, ski tips out of the water about 12 inches, feet apart, let the boat do the work...” Harry signals to the driver to get the slack out of the rope. Steeling myself for the ordeal ahead and assuming the just-right position, I yell to Frank, who is the spotter, “OK!” The motor roars, the rope tightens up and POP, I am up. Cheers from the boat. Cheers from Harry. Woohoo! I do several laps around the cove and, exhausted, I triumphantly throw the towrope into the air and gracefully glide back into the lake. The boat circles around, Frank sets out the ladder and I wobble up the steps. I wrap myself in a big towel and plop onto the seat, shivering, happy and proud. I did it! There was nothing like coming home to breakfast after a summer morning of water skiing. Pancakes were one of our favorites and, in blueberry season, we would have blueberry pancakes. The below recipe calls for yogurt, which gives the pancakes a silky, tender texture. I usually use plain 10 percent milkfat Greek yogurt, but you can substitute vanilla or blueberry flavor. Feel free to experiment—in fact, use any kind of berries that you have on hand, pairing them with plain, vanilla or other berry-flavored yogurts.
1½ cups flour 1½ teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon salt 2 eggs 2 tablespoons sugar 2 tablespoons melted butter 1 cup plain yogurt ½ to 1cup milk 1½ to 2 cups blueberries, rinsed and picked over for stems Additional butter for frying the pancakes
1. In a medium-sized bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt; set aside. 2. Whisk the eggs and sugar until light. 3. In a covered bowl, melt the butter in the microwave. 4. Stir in the yogurt, melted butter and a bit of the milk into the egg and sugar mixture. Add in the sifted dry ingredients and stir in some additional milk until the pancake batter is the consistency of thick cream. Fold in the blueberries. 5. Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a large frying pan or skillet. Lower the heat to medium and ladle the pancake batter into the pan. In a couple of minutes when the tops of the pancakes start to bubble, flip the pancakes and let them brown up on the other side. 6. Serve immediately with additional butter and maple syrup. Serves 2-3