What I Do for Love

I have been a misfit for most of my life. When I lived in Salt Lake City, I did not ski. After two lessons I decided it was a pain in the ass and spent the snowy months indoors. This caused much consternation among the locals, who were always aghast at the news, taking a few steps back and fairly shouting, "what do you mean, you don't ski?" My husband, a true man of the people, took more lessons and stuck with it. Even though he also was afraid he would end up writing with a pen in his mouth, he persevered, because that's what you do in Utah; you ski.

Now I live in Maine and it's summer. Summer in Maine is supposed to be grand, the linchpin in the whole "The Way Life Should Be" thing. In fact, people from other places come here for vacations, traveling long distances for a week or two at lakeside cabins or beach cottages, their kayaks and bikes adorning their cars like flags. They eat lobster rolls and enjoy water sports, and while I do enjoy a good boat ride, I don't eat lobster. In Maine, this is against nature. Besides which, I find summer nauseating, what with the heat and the bugs and the itching and the sweating, and it's really not much better here than anywhere else. However, I am married to a man who loves summer, loves the beach, swims in the ocean even though he saw "Jaws," doesn't sunburn, and thinks sweat is sexy.

Today the prediction is for 90 degrees and so naturally we are going to the beach. I will load up my L. L. Bean canvas tote bag with towels and sunblock and bug repellent and a beach blanket and some books and magazines and get out there and bake with the rest of the flock. While this alarms me, especially with my recent bout of basal cell carcinoma, as half of a married couple, it's what I do.