What does this little guy have to do with our family vacation? Read on!

For many Americans, and famously for much of Western Europe, August is vacation season. Everyone who’s anyone decamps for mountains, lakes, beaches, theme parks, the family cabin, the campground… you get the idea. We’re not going anywhere; in fact, we haven’t gone on vacation in any real sense (that is, for more than a few days; to somewhere that doesn’t involve visiting a relative; or to a place that has bought new sheets for the beds in the last four decades–more on that later) for, um, ever? I, personally, haven’t been on vacation For Real since my honeymoon.

I’m not kvetching, really, just stating a fact as a way of introduction to my somewhat accidental vacation stance when it comes to my children.

When I was a kid, we went on usually one vacation per year, nearly always in the summer, and nearly always to the Catskill Mountains, about a four hour drive north of us in New York State. Back then (as now, I guess), the mountains were studded with resorts, from tiny, pokey, inexpensive places with cabins and a bell that called guests to family-style meals, to higher-end places with indoor and outdoor pools, skating rinks, and evening entertainment. Guess which kind we went to? Yep, the first kind. And we LOVED it. From when I was tiny, we went to a place in Round Top, NY, called Riedlbauer’s, which as you can see from the name was (and still is) owned and run by Germans. Why an extended family of Italian-Americans fell in love with this meat-and-potatoes (literally) place, with nonstop German music emanating from hidden speakers and Alpine-village gingerbread trim on the buildings, I’ll never know. I’m going to assume it had to do with the price. Which was cheap. REALLY cheap.

But it was fun — and we didn’t know any better. We didn’t know there were Caribbean resorts, or even nice hotels on beaches in Florida (we did go to Florida when we were a bit older, during February break, but that was only after our grandparents had become snowbirds and had winter dwellings there. Nothing like spending a winter vacation in a retirement village. Whatever: there was a pool!).

But back to Riedlbauer’s. As kids, we’d spend a July or August week there, eating our three square meals (plus dessert!) a day, swimming in the pool, hiking through the woods, splashing in the cool mountain creeks and waterfalls. My kids have now been to Riedlbauer’s a couple of times, for long weekends in October. It’s become something of a tradition, with my parents, my brother and sister in law, and my sister and her three nearly-grown kids. We don’t care for the food, as abundant as it is (they’re nice, warm, welcoming people, the family who runs the place, but they wouldn’t know a salad or a fresh vegetable if it was dumped over their heads, though it’s a great place if you like meat, with side dishes of potates, and perhaps more meat); the rooms have not been redecorated since an “upgrade” sometime in the mid-seventies; the sheets are scratchy; that German music never stops; and the entertainment involves the owner, Henry, on his electric keyboard, accompanied by an accordionist, and every so often some German folk dancing.

But it’s a total blast. We all sit around these 1970s Formica tables in the main room at night, getting pitchers of beer from the bar and doing the Chicken Dance with the kids. Days, we hike the same trails we hiked as kids, to the same sites: Polly’s Rock, with its views over the gentle mountains, and the wide pool with the waterfall you can walk behind. Watching my boys toss flat, smooth rocks into the same pools my father once did is, you know, priceless.

A sight to see, generation after generation.

Daniel and James learning to skip creek-smooth stones.

I don’t have any photos of the food, possibly because goulash doesn’t really photograph that well, but suffice to say we get a lot of laughs out of dinner (and the boys end up making up most meals from the bread and butter, and the peanut butter and snacks I tote from home). But I have to show you the beds, with the acid-yellow spreads:

The furniture and bedding is distinctly 1970 (or even earlier).

One major thing going to Riedlbauer’s has done for my boys — and for me — is to cement the idea that an extended family, ranging in age from 4 to 72, can all have fun doing the same things at the same time. And another thing it’s done just for my children is to give them wildly low expectations of what a family vacation can be.

There are kids in my son’s class who go on an annual cruise, routinely hit Disney World, and have been to the kind of posh all-inclusive island resort I didn’t even know existed until I was fully grown. That’s fine; I’m not dissing those parents. If could have afforded a way cooler vacation, with way better food and sheets with a much higher thread count, I’d have done it, and I will, someday, when our finances allow. I want to treat my kids, give them things I didn’t have, all that stuff that’s natural for parents.

But I’m actually kind of gratified that a pokey spot like Riedlbauer’s makes my kids happy. Crazy happy, in fact. I’m gratified that this is what Daniel asked me a few months ago, when it suddenly occurred to him that other people had other types of vacations:

“Mom? Is there someplace besides Riedlbauer’s?”

See. Low expectations. Next vacation stop: probably my parents’ Florida condo come February. If they see a fancy hotel room before they’re 10, they just may explode with happiness. And that’s just fine with me.

I’m having a “first” this summer, as a parent. First time that I am — on the face of it, anyway — just being, here at home, with my sons. It’s been … interesting, a word my high school English teacher (rest in peace, Ms. Richman) instructed us to avoid at all costs because it’s basically useless as a descriptor, but in some cases, I’ve found, it has its place, especially when loaded with irony. As it is now.

But let me give you some background on this whole summer thing. As I’ve said before here, I’ve always worked, and of course that includes summer. However, since James was born, I’ve been freelance, which means my office is in my home, my commute is short and sweet (up the stairs!), and my time — theoretically, at least — is my own. But anyone who is freelance or who has his or her own business knows, there are no every-other-Friday paychecks, no paid vacations, no slacking off (unless you don’t, you know, want to get those sweet, sweet checks in the mail).

So I work, and the boys have evolved from daycare to daycamp. But this year, I decided that I’d leave the first few weeks of summer childcare- and camp-free. Just the three of us, our little pool, our swingset, the kids on the cul-de-sac where we ride our bikes. We’d see what was free at the library, get together with friends for park and beach trips, and eat ice pops with abandon.

I thought the three weeks (four for James, whose pre-K very (in)conveniently ended a week before the district’s public schools) would drag, that I’d be frantic to fill the hours.

Truth be told, I’ve enjoyed it. A lot. More than I expected.

This is not to say that I have not been bored. I have. Kind of like when I was a kid myself; some days dragged, even if the summer itself zoomed as fast as my 6-year-old on his newly-free-of-training-wheels bicycle (Daniel! Slow DOWN! Brakes! Brakes!).

My biggest surprises, and my greatest satisfaction, have come in the small moments.

• Bicycles. My boys are addicted to riding, and we hit the cul-de-sac once or twice a day so they can ride semi-traffic-free. One neighbor there has a couple chairs on his front lawn, and they’ve been away, so I’m not shy about sitting up on their lawn so I can watch the boys in comfort. One day last week, as the boys zoomed an glided and followed a few other kids in figure-eights up and down driveways, I was sort of regretting not having brought reading material. But then I just stopped, and felt the breeze in the lawn’s cool shade, and watched. And remembered just how utterly free I used to feel on my own bike (the sparkly banana-seat bike with the tassels on its handles), as though there were no boundaries to life at all.
  

  Here's Daniel, freshly free of training wheels.

• The planetarium. We nabbed free passes (thank you, for the zillionth time, South Huntington Public Library!) to the American Museum of Natural History in New York, and went in with friends for a day last week, which included a show at the fantastic Hayden Planetarium, part of the newly and breathtakingly refurbished Rose Center for Earth and Space. They can call it anything fancy in the world they like, but it’s a planetarium, and I love planetariums. The round room, the giant, curved ceiling, the high-backed comfy chairs, the dark and the cool. We took a Journey to the Stars, and it was fabulous. So caught up was I in a geeky fascination for the story of the first stars’ birth 13 billion years ago, that I almost forgot to check to see if the boys were scared or bored or doing something they shouldn’t. And when I snuck a sideways glance, I saw their heads tilted back, their eyes wide and fixed on the ceiling, mesmerized by the immensity of the universe.

• Summer haircuts. I’m fairly lazy with the boys’ hair, tending to let it get pretty shaggy before I break down and get their heads barbered. But I find I like it this way, because when they finally get their short summer ‘dos, it’s like I get to see their summery faces emerge, all fresh and (at least for Daniel) summer-freckled. Here they are, freshly shorn by our haircutting neighbor (bless her), Patty:

• Pajama time. Though I always kind of inwardly scoff at other moms I know who look forward to school vacations so they don’t have to get up early and get the kids out the door, there is something to be said for lengthy pajama mornings. My kids are up early regardless, and I never thought it was such a hassle to get them dressed and breakfasted and ready for school. Now that I also don’t have to pack camp lunches and get their camp backpacks sorted out before 8:30 a.m., we are free to see where the morning takes us. OK, truth time here: these so-called leisurely PJ spells are mostly leisurely to them. I use the time to catch up on some work (because, see above, the freelance life doesn’t allow for total vacations, and I have had some deadlines in this so-called “carefree” time), or to do some neglected household chores. But it’s still kind of nice to know that I can be up here in my office, making a quick call or typing up some notes for a story, and hear them downstairs, introducing the cars from the movie “Cars” to their Thomas trains. And isn’t it awesome that the cars and the trains can be friends and share their fictional worlds?

Curmudgeon that I am; mean, time-schedule loving, relentlessly practical mommy that I am, I have to admit: I’ve loved my three-week summer.

But I also love camp! Seven more days …