Summer Getaways Contest Winner!!
Author:Date: July 15th, 2008
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Thanks to all the readers who made our Summer Getaways contest so enjoyable! Pouring through the 55 submissions I received was a real treat, and choosing a winner was no easy task! There were cheerful trips to Disneyland, adventurous leaps off Arizona cliffs, rejuvenating moments in nature, memorable cross-country drives with the family and heart-wrenching tales of loss and triumph.
The following essay won for these reasons: It was sweet, simple, honest and nostalgic. It pulled at my heartstrings without trying hard to do so, and it transported me to a different time with ease and gracefulness. And, as a hopeless romantic, it made me yearn for a similar life story.
Congratulations to Elaine Lessell of Scottsdale for recently celebrating her 55th wedding anniversary, and for winning our first-ever Summer Getaways contest with the following submission:
My favorite summer vacation took place at the West End Country Club in Loch Sheldrake, New York. It was August 1948, the summer before I entered college. My mother and I went to the hotel for one week. (We always alternated the beach and the Catskills each year.) The day after I arrived, I was sitting on the lawn with my mother, when a young man approached me and asked if I attended a certain High School in Brooklyn, New York. I told him that I had just graduated from Poughkeepsie High and was starting college the following month. I found out that he was the band leader at the hotel and was entering his second year of college. Needless to say, I spent the week with him. Most of the evenings were seated on the bandstand next to the pianist. Our long distance romance continued with phone calls, letters, and holiday visits. We were married at Camp Pickett in Virginia in February 1953. My husband was stationed there. He was shipped out in April to Big Delta, Alaska, where we lived in a 21-foot trailer without running water. We returned to the states Friday, August 13, 1954. We both taught in the N.Y.C. school system. (I began after our 3 sons were in High School.) We just celebrated our 55th wedding anniversary with our sons, daughters in-law and 7 grandchildren. We have been in Arizona for 21 years, and that week in 1948 was the most memorable vacation of my life.