Vashon memories

Editor’s note: This column ran a few years ago. Tressa asked that it run again in part because of the strong response it stirred when it first appeared in The Beachcomber.

When I was a kid in the ’60s and ’70s, low tide lasted all day long.

We ran in the warm wet sand, dipped in the cold salt water and held wedding ceremonies wearing seaweed gowns and veils. We built exceptional sand castles and marked our territories by carving a thick moat in the sand with a big stick. The stick became the flagpole, and no one was allowed to enter our territory without knowing the secret password. We chased crabs and played in the tide pools from early morning to late afternoon.

I recently asked my mother, “How is it that low tide lasted all day long when we were kids?” “Well,” she replied with a smile, “I sent you kids out to the beach as soon as the tide shifted. You played out there while the tide went out, while it was out and all the while it came back in. That took all day.”

We had way more chores than any other neighborhood kids. The entire brood of neighbor kids would come help us finish our chores so that we could play. I now realize my parents were brilliant. They had their six kids plus all the neighbor kids pulling weeds, sweeping decks and cleaning toilets!

Across the road stood a huge empty forest to be romped and galloped through. We played horses and developed communities of forts, and you had to work for your lunch. There were endless hours of playing cowboys and Indians where fierce raids and attacks filled the woods with whooping and hollering.

These games continued well into our early teens; then the peace pipe was introduced, and nobody wanted to be cowboys anymore.

We slept in a long row of sleeping bags stretched across a canvas tarp. We watched falling stars dance across the sky and made wish after wish. We each chose a star, our very own star, and told each other fabulous fabricated stories about our personal star. Now, so many years later, I look up and see Eric’s star, and there is Laurel’s, Karen’s, Jena’s and mine. We all slumbered together night after night out on the beach where waves lapping the shore and breathing sweet salt air was the nightly lullaby that rocked us to sleep.

The years went by and the seasons changed. We all grew tall, and one by one most moved away to other houses, other towns. Sharing our childhood created an everlasting and all-knowing connection.

Today, with our spouses, partners and children, we haul our sleeping bags to the beach and line up on tarps every third of July. It is our opportunity to connect each year, to know each other’s children, partners and lives. We share tears, s’mores and joys around a beach fire, just as we did all through the years of growing up. At 5 a.m., we wake to the beautiful buzzing bees of the hydro race on the Fourth of July, and we remember and smile.

We cherish the memories and small traditions from growing up on Vashon.

— Tressa Azpiri, a Vashon native, lives on a 10-acre organic farm in Jamaica.