The Rhythm of Summer Traditions
Khaleesi and Janice Bangs
Summer has officially arrived, and as fun as author events have been, I'm taking a short pause from filling my calendar with them. Instead, it's filled with something even better!
This summer, I'm celebrating and hosting my mom's 90th birthday, which has been a fun trip through nine decades of photos, stories, and memories. I'm also looking forward to visits from lifelong friends who make the trek to Oregon every year.
It got me thinking about how repetition quietly becomes tradition—and how those traditions become lifelong memories.
When I was growing up, every other summer meant a trip to Lake Chelan. We stayed in the same little family-owned cabins year after year. We'd run between the swimming pool and the lake until our fingers looked like raisins, fish until we got bored (which usually happened before the fish cooperated), and pick apricots straight off the trees.
Looking back, I don't remember every detail, but I remember exactly how those trips felt. That's what made them special.
Years later, when my own kids came along, I wanted to create that same feeling for them. Every other summer we'd head to Leavenworth to a friend's cabin to drift the Wenatchee River, challenge each other to miniature golf (I still maintain there was some suspicious scorekeeping), and finish the day with our favorite Bavarian meal. The summers in-between, we'd head to the Oregon coast to play in the sand, bask in the sun (or rain!), and enjoy all-you-can-eat crab.
As an author, I've been thinking about repetition a lot lately. There's a reason little ones ask for the same bedtime story again... and again... and just one more time. Repetition builds memory, but it also builds comfort.
I saw that at every spring story time for Mama Duck's Lost Duckling. Before long, the children weren't just listening—they were happily shouting, "Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle... crack, crack, crack!" right along with me. They knew it was coming, and they couldn't wait.
Maybe we're not so different as adults. We return to the same vacation spots, cook the same favorite recipes, invite the same friends over every summer, and tell the same family stories—usually to someone who says, "You've told us that before," while secretly hoping you'll tell it anyway because nothing makes us laugh harder than shared stories told over and over.
So, wherever this summer takes you, I hope you make time for the familiar things. Visit that favorite park. Take the annual camping trip. Eat the peach cobbler. Read the bedtime story one more time.
The big adventures are wonderful. But sometimes it's the little things we do over and over again that become the memories we treasure most.
Happy Summer!
Janice
