Erie Hotel

Around 2004, my family and I started going on vacations to Erie twice a summer. Accompanying us on these excursions were the Jenkinses-- family friends who were more like actual family. In addition to our typical week at the beach, they joined us for a sneak peek weekend earlier in the summer where we stayed at a hotel by the airport. We'd sit on the lawn, watching planes, us kids running around, the adults drinking beer. The outside pool was our home. Cole & I would jump into the deep end ad infinitum, never ceasing to find the utmost joy in so simple an act. He commented on the blonde strands of hair on my head, I lied and said that was my natural color-- just wanted to be blonde. But now the hotel is relegated only to memory; the long, entrance hallway; breakfast area where I burnt my mouth by sipping hot chocolate through a straw, like a dumbass, in 2005.