My current crush and I will visiting the same local pond I wrote about a year ago in “Forever Snug.” It is Memorial Day weekend in the United States, and summer appeared here last week in the Mid-Hudson Valley with a surprising suddenness. Or that was just me not noticing things, a terrible habit for someone who types as much as I do. The column, edited to reflect 2016:

It was one of those days in which the lifeguards outnumbered the swimmers. We were at a local park that features a small lake and beach: on holiday weekends families travel to more prominent parks that feature rides as an added distraction. So the crowds were elsewhere even on a sunny Saturday afternoon, and we were one couple out of maybe ten groups. Two families, each with three water-loving toddlers, splashed about, and none of the children were yet old enough to test their limits against the flimsy, algae-covered nylon rope demarcating the “deep end” of the pond on three sides. The lifeguards chatted with the families, flirted with each other, bought each other ice cream, and burned off the ice cream calories breaking each others’ speed records chasing after the tuneful ice cream truck.
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