Love Notes from Summer Camp

Amy and I looked at each other like a pair of hyperthyroid owls, and then I said, "We do like each other a lot, sweetie, but we've been taking it slowly. You mom's and my divorce wasn't that long ago, and we didn't want to move too fast for you girls."

Cindy said, "The heck with slow! We girls all love each other and want to be sisters together. You two must love each other — you kiss each other all the time, and your beds have been pushed together for months now. We're tired of waiting for you two slowpokes. So, Ron, will you and Lily and Milly marry me and Lori and Mom? "

The twins chimed in, "Yeah, Amy, will you and Lori and Cindy marry us?"

Amy and I were speechless for a moment. We looked at each other, then back at the four stern-looking little girls. All resistance crumbled, and Amy laughed, "This is not quite how I'd envisioned our proposal going, but sure! I'll marry you guys!"

I shook my head, laughed and said, "OK, girls! I'll marry you guys too. However..."

The girls looked a bit uncertain. Lily said, "However, what, Dad?"

I stared right back at the girls, and said, "However, when you propose to someone, isn't it customary to give them a ring?"

I stuck my left hand out, waggled my left ring finger, and said "Ring, please!"

Amy put her right hand behind her right ear, tilted her head in a faux glamour pose, and then stuck her left hand out and said, "He's right. We're not easy. We're not going to give it up without a ring!"

The girls looked at each other and then back at me and Amy through slitted eyes, with the air of a group of card sharps about to pull out a set of unsuspected aces. They reached in their pockets and pulled out a handful of rings crocheted from colorful and sparkly yarn. Each girl proceeded to slip one of her rings onto my and Amy's ring fingers. Then they slipped on on each other's ring fingers.

Milly said, "We made these at family camp in Oregon. We thought we'd get to use them a lot sooner, but you two are soooooo slooooow!" She turned to the other girls and said, "Proposal accepted! We're going to be sisters!" And then, turning back to Amy and me, and said, "And NO take-backs!!"

The girls all shrieked, and then jumped on us in a large, weepy, puppy-pile.

* * *

Amy and I were awakened early the next morning by four girls jumping in bed with us. Lily announced, "Get up, sleepyheads. It's time for breakfast, and then we're going ring shopping!"

Amy said, "But we all have rings! You gave them to us last night!"

Lori replied, "Duh, Mom! Those were the engagement rings. Now we need to get the wedding rings."

Thinking quickly, I said, "You guys made the engagement rings for us. Isn't it Amy's and my turn to get the rings this time?"

The girls liked that idea.

"OK, get out of here so we can get dressed. Then, we're all going out for pancakes!"

After breakfast, we went out for a walk in Discovery Park. As we walked along the trail on the bluffs above Puget Sound, the girls gamboled on ahead, giving Amy and me a chance to talk.

Amy started. "Wow, when we came up here for the weekend, I did not imagine that I would be going back to Olympia engaged. We are, aren't we?"

"Yep, no take-backs. Anyway, I'm sure that one of us would have popped the question to the other sooner or later."

Amy sighed. "Yes, no complaints there. The thought of marrying you delights me no end. However, I'm a bit concerned for the future. If those Machiavellian little rats can convince us to do this, who knows what else they will try to talk us into?"

"That is an interesting but terrifying thought. Let's hope they use their goddess-like powers for good, and not just personal gain. However, now that we are engaged, do you have any thoughts about the rings?"

Amy pondered. "Yes, a few. That proposal took my breath away. And the idea of all six of us getting wedding rings is really touching. What an astonishing set of girls we have."

"Yeah, they are. And how are we going to find a set of rings worthy of these astonishing young ladies?"

"That's my second idea. I have a friend who makes custom jewelry out of various metals. She started out selling her stuff at folk festivals, but now has a store down at Pike Place Market. She made the earrings I'm wearing now."

I looked closely at the tiny platinum and onyx orcas leaping on her ear lobes. "Those are amazing! When can we visit her shop?"

* * *

A few weeks later, Amy caught the morning train up to Seattle. I met her at the King Street Station, and we then took the light rail over to the stop nearest the Market. Amy's friend Frannie had a small but elegant shop on the level below the fish market. She showed us some of her finished work. After discussing the pros and cons of various metals, we settled on gold for the rings.

Frannie showed us a wide variety of possible ring designs, but we kept going back to a one design, which paired a simple gold signet ring with a floral pattern formed by an inlays of semiprecious stones. Amy said, "I like the shape of the ring, but am not wild about the flowers."

Frannie said, "Then tell me what you guys are wild about. I can build a design around that."

We told her how we had met at the music camp, and had fallen in love over a common joy of music and dance. Amy suggested, "Could you inlay something musical?"

"No problem. What did you have in mind?"

I said, "You know, I started falling for you when you gave me that very first piano lesson. You showed me some basic chords and scales, and then started playing rock and roll. I was blown away, and I thought, 'What an amazing woman!' Could you design something that conveys that?"

Frannie took some colored pencils and paper, and started sketching. Ideas flew back and forth, and several interesting possibilities emerged. Finally, Frannie drew a design that we all liked: a set of three musical notes intertwined in a Celtic knot. Then she imported the design into a drafting program on her laptop. She tweaked the design and varied the colors of the inlays. She asked us, "What if I engraved this knot on the signet, and then inlaid the notes with some pieces of lapis lazuli. The blue notes would be a nod to the blues scale."

Amy said, "Oooh, blue notes. I like it!"

I said, "For me, those blue notes are our love notes. I like it too!"

"OK!" said Frannie. "I'll play with this basic concept and send you a more refined draft for your approval. Since you want a similar design for your four daughters, I'll come up with a design that will work on smaller fingers, and allow them to resize the rings as they grow up."

We left her a deposit and went off to a nice lunch in downtown Seattle before Amy's train back to Olympia. We received the final draft of our ring design two weeks later. The girls gave their approval, and Frannie got to work. She promised to have all of the rings ready by late April.

Mark and Lisa were delighted, but not surprised to hear about the engagement. They laughed and cried when we told them about the proposal, and promised to help plan the wedding. They hosted another sleepover for our girls, and we had a wedding brainstorming party. Mark promised to not only arrange music for the wedding, but also to click on the instant ordination page of the Universal Life Church and officiate the wedding.

The six little girls had lots of great ideas, and some of them were actually practical. They wanted the wedding to take place at family camp the following June. Lisa pointed out that having a big wedding during the camp would be pretty disruptive for the other campers. However, she had another idea, and made a few phone calls. She soon reported back to the group that the camp facility in Idaho had had a sudden cancellation for the week prior to family camp. We could rent the whole facility! Everyone else loved the idea, and Lisa called back and put down a deposit.

After a bit more planning, we decided to invite everyone on our wedding list to come and spend a week at "Amy and Ron Camp". Guests would stay in the cabins and do regular camp activities all week. Friends coming to the family camp could come a day early and attend the wedding, which would take place on Saturday afternoon. After the wedding, the regular guests would head home. For the honeymoon, Amy and I and our girls would stay at the camp and attend the family camp starting Sunday evening.

* * *

The twins were with Sarah for Christmas week, and with me during New Year's week. We therefore signed up all six of us for the New Year's Folk Camp on Vashon Island. The weather gods delivered the usual cold and wet January. However, we and the girls slept snugly in our cabin. The main lodge with its stone fireplace stayed cozy all weekend. Simple but hot camp food and bottomless mugs of cocoa kept our energy levels up for dancing, playing music, board games, jigsaw puzzles, hiking and tide pooling. One day during lunch, someone yelled "Whales!" The whole camp poured out of the dining hall and watched for 30 minutes while a pod of orcas swam by the camp. On New Year's Eve, the girls all got to dress in their camp finery, stay up late and ring in the New Year with cups of sparkling cider. The next day, we packed up our stuff into Amy's van and took the ferry back to Seattle. The girls all loved our time on Vashon Island and voted to return next year.

* * *

Sarah and I continued to see each other at our weekly handoff at least once a month. Usually this went without drama and without much conversation. However, in mid-March, I noted that Sarah seemed a bit depressed. By now, I was feeling benevolent enough to ask, "Sarah, are you OK?"

She hung her head, and said, "No, I'm not. I don't have any right to ask you, but could we go get some coffee and talk about it?"

I was surprised to hear myself agreeing. "Sure, let's go to that coffee place over on Market Street." Wow. Just a year ago, just the sight of Sarah would have been a hollow, gut-punched reminder of her betrayal. Somehow, I didn't feel that now. Interesting.

We both grabbed a latte and I started to sit down. Sarah said, "Can we talk about this in your car? It will be too hard for me to say all of this in public."

I nodded, unlocked my car, and we both got in.

"Ron, thank you for agreeing to see me. I don't have anyone else I can talk to about this, and I'm just barely hanging on. I haven't told the girls yet, but I've dumped Jason. I discovered last week that he has been cheating on me for the past few months. Pretty ironic, isn't it? One cheater cheating on another cheater. Who could possibly have seen that coming? This should give you a good laugh," she said bitterly.

"Anyhow, I dumped his ass last week, and just got through moving all of my stuff into an apartment. That's where I'm taking the girls tonight."

I said, "Sarah, if I had heard this a year ago, I would have said, 'Yesssss!!!', pumped my fist, and done a Snoopy dance of joy. Now, it just makes me sad for you. I know exactly how it feels to be stabbed in the back by someone I trusted. You must feel like hammered crap right now."

Sarah started crying and said, "I know that I told you I was sorry for what I did for you, but I never imagined how badly it must have hurt. Now I know damned well how that feels. And it feels even worse because it's my own goddamned fault." Her crying turned into heart-wrenching sobs.

I leaned over and put my arms around her. She cried for several minutes, and finally subsided. When she was calm enough to speak, she pulled back from me and said, "Thank you for holding me. But how can you bring yourself to do that? You hated me so much that you would barely speak to me for months! That's how I feel about Jason right now. I can't imagine ever forgiving him. How can you be so nice to me right now!!?"

"I don't know. I did have dark thoughts and revenge fantasies about you and Fucktard for months. I was depressed and miserable for about nine months. The only thing that could make me smile or give a shit was our girls. I kept a lot of rage and bitterness inside me for months and months.

I don't know how I got over it, but I do know that it takes time. People gave me a lot of well-meaning advice that didn't help a fucking bit at the time. One person told me, 'The best revenge is living well.' Didn't make much sense to me then. In retrospect, I think that they were right. Something jolted me enough to start actively living again. I found myself spending time with people who brought me joy, and doing things that made me happy. Somewhere along the line, the rage faded and faded and finally just felt irrelevant to me. Whatever you're feeling right now, set it aside. Concentrate on doing things that are good for you and make you feel good. Your revenge over Scrotum Face is that he will never have the privilege of being with you or our girls again. He is his own nemesis, and will bring about his own doom without our assistance."

She grimaced. "Self-doom. I hope that he does as good a job of that as I did. My god — you must hate me so much."

"What I feel for you now is a bit more complex than that. I don't hate you. I don't love you, but I love what we used to have. I do still care about you, mostly because your well-being affects the well-being of our daughters. They still love you, and hurt when you hurt. For their sake, I forgive you for what you did to me."

Sarah began crying again. "Thank you. Your forgiveness means a lot to me, and someday maybe I can forgive myself." She paused for a moment. "On a different topic, congratulations. The girls don't tell me much about you, but I hear that you're getting married again to a woman named Amy. I hope that she treats you well and never fucks you over like I did."

"Thanks. The wedding will be in mid June on a lake in Idaho. I'm sure that the girls will invite you to the ceremony, and Amy and I would be happy to have you attend. We'll also understand if you don't come.

* * *

The wedding went off with only minor glitches. Several sets of elderly relatives refused to sleep in rustic cabins, so rooms were booked for them at the fancy resort in Coeur D'Alene at the north end of the lake. Mark also arranged for a boat shuttle to bring them all down the lake to the camp for the wedding. Everyone else had a ball canoeing, swimming, playing board games, and otherwise hanging out with family members. Sarah had been invited to the wedding by our daughters, but understandably declined.

On the day of the wedding, Mark pulled off a hat trick by being the best man, the wedding officiant and the leader of a musical procession down the hill from the cabins to the lakeshore, where the ceremony took place. I estimated that half of our guests brought an instrument, and joined in the processional band.

Lisa was the matron of honor, and all six of our girls were bridesmaids. As the big moment arrived, Amy and I pulled out the custom rings we had made, and slipped them on the fingers of each other's daughters. We then put rings on each other's fingers. Mark asked us and all of our daughters if we promised to love and protect each other. Each of us said "I do!", and Mark pronounced the families married.

After the ceremony, there was a feast cooked on an outdoor grill, with wedding cake for dessert. After the feast, the party moved into an open air dance pavilion. Mark had composed a beautiful waltz in honor of the bride and groom, and played it for our first dance as wife and man. After waltzing a few turns alone on the floor, we split up and pulled each other's daughters into the waltz. Amy and I said the magic words to our daughters: "Snowball waltz!" At that signal, the six of us split up and and asked other guests to dance. Eventually, almost everyone was out on the dance floor.

* * *

Amy and her daughters moved up to Seattle to live with me and the twins. Initially we slept in the master bedroom, and all four girls slept on two bunk beds in the girls' room. However, it was not long before we remodeled my house to add two more bedrooms and 2 more bathrooms. Lori and Cindy transferred to the same school as Lily and Milly, and quickly made friends there.

We and the girls became regulars at the local Seattle, Tacoma and Olympia contradances. Milly learned to play the fiddle, and Cindy got pretty good on guitar and banjo. Lily and Lori preferred to become dance callers. They occasionally did dance gigs together around the Pacific Northwest with Mark and Lisa. The girls convinced us to put all of the proceeds from these gigs into a fund to pay for future music and dance camps.

Over the next few years, we continued to attend as many music and dance camps as possible. The girls heard about dance camps in exotic locations such as the Virgin Islands, and lobbied for us to attend those as a family. When Amy and I blanched at the cost of airfare for six, the girls responded with innovative ways to earn money for the trips. They set up a babysitting service with their cousins that was quite popular. The girls also began doing yard work for neighbors. When that enterprise took off, our cute teenage girls had absolutely no trouble getting boys from their school to help them out.

We took the girls busking at street fairs, farmers' markets and the Pike Place Market. When we added the cash from all of these ventures to our family travel fund, we had enough to attend several folk festivals in England, France and the V.I.

* * *

Meanwhile, karmic payback came slowly but inexorably for Semen Breath. He eventually screwed one married woman too many and was beaten rather badly by her enraged spouse. The fractures to his face, legs and penis (yes, you can fracture that too — look it up) took months to heal. After that, his looks, his limp and his limp dick made him appealing only to the rare woman with a Quasimodo fetish. When I heard about this through the grapevine, I smiled briefly and then forgot all about him. Life with Amy and our girls kept me too busy and having too much fun to waste time thinking about Anus Mouth.

* * *

Amy and I continued to see Sarah frequently at the girls' school events. We were all cordial to each other, and over time, even became friendly again. At one event, Amy lamented to Sarah about how hard it was to get alone time with me. She was surprised when Sarah offered to take the four girls for the weekend, and asked Sarah, "Are you sure?"

"Why not?" said Sarah. "I don't have anything lined up for that weekend. Or for most weekends, for that matter."

"I don't know much about your social life. Are you dating anyone these days?"

"I have occasional dates, but no keepers so far. I've got to admit that I'm a bit gun shy about relationships. After blowing up my marriage to Ron for an affair with Fucktard, I don't trust my asshole filter any more."

"Fucktard? Asshole filter?"

"Yep. It used to bug the shit out of me when Ron called Jason that, but I'm on board now. It took me way too long to realize what a shit-heel he actually is. So, part of my penance to myself is to avoid saying his name. That has actually become a bonding experience with my girls these days. For such innocent and angelic-looking little girls, they can curse like drunken sailors when they want to. The twins have been especially inventive in thinking up new dysphemisms for him like 'Smegma Breath'."

Amy replied, "That's hilarious! And, 'dysphemisms' is such a great word! I've certainly heard quite a few of Ron's epithets for Jason. But, as long as I've known him, he's never used words like that to refer to you."

"Really? I would have thought he'd have plenty to say about me."

"He did. He certainly hated what you did to him and used lots of choice profanities to describe your actions. However, he never lost his respect for you as a great mom, and never talked down about you around the girls. However, I'd like you to tell me more about what you mean by your 'asshole filter'. I'm guessing that you aren't talking about some new, exotic sex toy?"