Mike and Marna went down the shore when Mike got home from work today. Mike went to turn the water on. Our house is completely closed up during the winter, no electric, no water, no gas, no phone. We have no heat....it's strictly a summer home, so it takes a bit of elbow grease to get in working order for the summer and even more work to get it closed in the fall.

We needed a new water heater before the water was turned on. We have had the same water heater since 1967. My grandfather built the house in 1926, with no hot water. He wouldn't allow hot water to be put in! He wanted that house the same as it was when he built it. I remember my mother boiling water for the big claw bath tub (that we still have) and boiling water to do dishes. What a pain!!! The outside shower felt very frosty after the beach with no hot water...but we took showers daily. Guess what my parents bought the summer after my grandfather died???? The water heater we just got rid of.

Mike called the plumber.....one we have used for years ......in the beginning of March, giving him PLENTY of time. We usually make our first weekend Mother's Day weekend....before that the nights are usually too cold. We can get some nippy nights after that too....but it's a good benchmark. About two weeks ago we really started bugging the plumber.....he called last Saturday, his stupid supplier sent an electric water heater so he had to wait until a gas one came in. So we finally got the call yesterday that the new water heater was in. The gas company needs 10 working days notice to get the gas turned on....I sent the letter out last Saturday. If it got there on Monday, it will be just 10 working days. I am so hoping they get it turned on by next Friday...if not we will have to wait another weekend and no one here wants to do that!!

Everyone gets excited about going down the shore for the first weekend. We almost count the days once Christmas arrives. On Christmas cards sent to shore friends (90% of whom are only summer residents), we always put something like "Only 5 more months", "See you in May", "Can't wait for May" and they do the same. Mike said neighbors from two blocks down drove by honking their horn and waving out the car windows....they are obviously caught up in the 'time to go down the shore' annual rite, as well.

Luckily the kids get caught up in this excitement as well. They are fortunate enough to have friends on our block. Marna has two year round resident kids as friends and Brody's best friends in the world are summer residents, staying at their grandmother's house all summer. I played with their mother, aunts and uncles when I was little!!! There are other kids who come every summer for a week or two and the kids always look forward to their arrival as well. Our block is unique in that several of the houses have been passed down through the generations (as ours has) and my kids are now playing with the children of kids I used to play with!

Our shore house is so special, not only because of its location, but because of its history. My mother spent every summer of her life there from age 9(except 3 years during WWII, when my father was in CA). I have never spent a summer anywhere else. It is definitely home for me. It's also special because my grandfather built it...every board nailed there was a labor of love. His hand prints are all over the ceiling of the unfinished upstairs where he oiled the tongue and groove boards so they would easily slide together. I love to lie in bed at night and look at them....there is even some of his figuring in pencil on the upstairs wall. My mother told me all the stories of her summers there as a young girl, it is certainly a different town from when she was young. I know the stories so well and have so many pictures I almost feel as though I was there in the 1920's. I have already begun to relate those stories to my kids. I will tell them many times so they too will know them as well as I do and will be able to tell their children. Sometimes I almost feel my grandfather looking down and smiling as he watches his great-grandchildren enjoy his home and the beach he loved.