Summertime is winding down. I had intended to chronicle events from throughout the past few months as they occurred. Didn't happen. I've decided instead to post various photos from the summer and tell the stories behind them.
This might be my favorite picture from our summer together. It was taken during a brief trip to Wrightsville Beach, N.C. in mid-July, one last hurrah as a family prior to my first day of employment at Ravenscroft.
After arriving late in the afternoon and dropping our bags in the room, we headed to the beach to take a family walk in the surf. Get our feet wet, if you will. Graham's delight was obvious as the water rushed over his legs. Before long he was soaked head-to-toe.
Erica and I experienced a tangible sense of relief that afternoon. Release even. It was the most relaxed we had been for quite some time. I wouldn't go so far as to say that we didn't have a care in the world; keeping Graham from drowning did provide some stress. However, our minds were free of the concerns that had occupied so much of our mental space the previous few months.
My first experience as a Durham Academy employee was an administrative team retreat to the same beach. Same hotel even. They were there again in the days prior to our arrival. They wrapped up their retreat the very morning that our brief trip began.
Our paths did not cross. Fittingly, they left prior to our arrival. It felt like we were finally starting to put that experience behind us.
