To the editor:
I have always enjoyed going to Pleasant Lake for our vacation in Maine. My parents first started going there back in the 1940s after the war. The big attraction then, as now, was smallmouth bass fishing. I started going along in the ‘50s for either two- or three-week vacations. We stayed in one of the log cabins that were part of Birch Point Lodge. Mom and Dad eventually became good friends with the proprietors Joe and Delma Edwards. In addition to the accommodations, Joe and Delma also served breakfast, lunch, and dinner as part of the time with them. Later, in the ‘60s, Joe converted each of the eight log cabins into light housekeeping units. This freed up the need for the dining room and also gave the guests more liberty with their time: eat when you feel like cooking.
In time it was obvious that Mom and Dad, after retirement, wanted to spend the entire summer on Pleasant Lake. As a result, they bought a cabin across the lake from the lodge. The friendship between the two families grew even stronger. A typical day for Mom was to go golfing with Delma, head back to the lodge to play Spite and Malice, and be back across the lake to make dinner for Dad and whoever else was there. For Dad it was a day across the lake with Joe, helping with whatever project Joe was engaged in at the time. He would be home in time for dinner and then a little smelt fishing after dinner until dark. Mom and Dad would arrive in Maine in late May and stay until September.
Now it was well known that in the ‘40s and ‘50s Mom and Dad would be at the lodge for three weeks. And when they started staying for the entire summer it also was known that they would be there until September. As for me, my family and I would only stay for two or three weeks and for some summers even longer.
My time on Pleasant Lake varied from year to year. Some years I would go up to the cabin two or three times a summer as little as one week and sometimes as long as six weeks. So the question, when I arrived, was always, “So, how long ya up for?” This question came from every, and I mean every person I knew in and around Island Falls. I could bet the bank that the first time I saw Joey or Steve Edwards each summer they would say “You’re back. So how long ya up for?” If I returned to Pennsylvania and came back again the same summer, undoubtedly the question would be asked.
I made the mistake of mentioning to Tony and Carmel Bowers, our neighbors next door to our cabin, that if I ever wrote a book, I would title the book, “So, How Long Ya Up For?” Now Tony was big on always asking me the question. I didn’t think anything about the fact that I told him the name of the book until the very next time I came back to the cabin from Pennsylvania. I saw Tony and it was obvious that he couldn’t wait to ask me the question. “So, you gonna be up for two weeks this time or three? Gotcha.” It doesn’t matter what they say, this book’s title is what it is.
There’s one last thing I have to mention. The day after I wrote “So, How Long Ya Up For?” I went golfing at the Links of Lake Bernadette in Florida. My wife, Fern, and I were paired up with two guys from Detroit, a father and son. The father was snowbirding and the son visiting for a couple of days. The father asked where we were from and we said that we lived about an hour north of Philly. With that he asked the obvious question, “So How Long Ya Down For?” I suppose when I go to Arizona this winter someone will ask, “So how long ya out for?
Allen Zepp
Perkasie, Penn.
