The part of my mind that keeps perfect memories lives in the October of my childhood. There’s the warm grey sky and orange pumpkins dotting quiet porches. The brilliant red and gold maple leaves resting on the tired, pale grass.  

When I was little, I remember staying at my aunt and uncle’s lake house in the fall, raking leaves into the outline of a pretend house with rooms enough for my pretend family—a house I would live in exactly one hundred years from then. When I was a grown-up.  

In a house made of leaves, I would be happy. 

I stood at the edge of the pier, staring at the wet cotton line disappearing into the soft surface of the water. My “fishing pole” was a string connected to the end of a stick. The other end of the string was tied to a piece of soft, white bread. I was fishing. The clear green lake water lapped at my piece of bread until it dissolved and eventually disappeared. 

…  

After my family moved away, my aunt and uncle continued to share their lake with me. As a teenager, I spent summers living in the sun listening to ’80s FM radio. The radio had a black leather case and a handle. I carried it to the water with me every day. Music connected me to myself and my future.  

I can still feel the cadence of my uncle’s footfalls and the hollow shake of the pier under my folding lounge chair. Lying face down in my purple floral Op ruffled bikini, the woven plastic chair tubing made lines across my face. I was working hard at doing absolutely nothing.  

“How’s it going, Bean?” he asked.  

“I’m bored,” I said.  

“BEAN!” he said, “Someday you’re going to look back on this and WISH you were so bored!”  

“I guess…,” I said, Bain de Soliel and Sun In baking the tan and blonde into my skin and hair.  

He was right.  

…  

My uncle passed away from brain cancer some years ago. The big grief is over, but I’m still sad. My head is a running cliché: “Live each day as if it were your last.” Who really does that?  

I am still troubled by my own questions about life and death. He was a huge personality and still had a lot of life to live and love to share—things to do. He was social and entertaining. He liked Tina Turner and Elvis. He loved cars and order. He talked and listened. 

He drank beer right after jogging in the sweltering Midwest heat. 

I miss him and think about him all the time. When I wash my car or mow my lawn. When I yell during football games or hear “Yo, Adrian” in Rocky. When I poach an egg or mix an Old Fashioned.  

When I make a BLT for breakfast.  

Today, I made a BLT for breakfast. I thought about mornings at the lake and sleeping in through the chiming coming from the clock on the wall near my room, marking every quarter hour. I remember the sounds of boat motors finally forcing me out of bed and meeting my aunt and uncle outside under the yellow and white patio umbrella in my bare feet and jammies. 

My aunt would soon take her weekend post in the sun. My uncle had already been up for hours—washed the car (perfect 1973 Buick convertible), mowed the lawn (lines toward the direction of the lake), went running (rehydrating with a beer), and maybe “relocated” several squirrels.  

“Bean. How about a BLT?” he asked.  

“Yes!” I said, all smiles.  

Just then, Tina Turner’s “What’s Love Got to Do with It” came on the radio.  

“Bean, what’s love got to do with it?” he asked, tilting his head like he did when he expected a thoughtful answer.  

He always talked to me like an adult and was interested in my opinions and the way I saw the world. 

But I was seventeen. It was Saturday, 1984. I just got up. My thinking didn’t extend far beyond a BLT and waterskiing. Music videos and boys. 

“I don’t know,” I said. “Everything?” 

He smiled, nodded satisfied, looked up at the rising thermometer, and went inside to cook bacon.  

Yes. Love has everything to do with it.