Our family just returned from our annual pilgrimage to Door County and our trip, that place, is still on my mind. I talk about Door County so frequently that one friend joked, “We get it, you went on vacation. Must be nice.” 

Said friend recently went to Ireland, so I don’t feel bad talking about a trek by old van across the same time zone. But he’s right, I talk about my happy place a lot. Maybe it’s because the open fields remind me of where I grew up in Iowa, or because its “high of 75” forecasts are a reprieve from the weather we’ve been having, the kind that feels like walking into someone’s mouth when you step out the door. 

Maybe it’s because there’s something so lovely about returning year after year to a place where I don’t need a map. I know exactly which roads to bike down to buy the perfect iced latte. My travel bucket list sits idly by as we return, again and again, to the familiar sights of Door County (Deer! Sailboats! Lighthouses!).

It’s more than that for me, though. It’s the welcoming arms of our children’s surrogate grandparents, who show Margaret all the updates made to the train set since our last visit. Who lend our son an electric bike and tell him to go explore. Who know the name of every flower and plant (Great White Trillium! Prairie Coreopsis! Wild Geranium!). Who tell us, “We’re being very low-key. Do whatever you want or don’t want. We’ll just go with the flow.” 

While others take stock of their year each December, I celebrate the turning of another page in July. During morning walks along meadows, deer leaping through the fields, I ponder where we’ve been, what’s working, and what changes are to come. I look at my husband, another year passed, and am grateful we’re still together. We measure our kids against the tick marks on the farmhouse wall. They’re both outpacing their statuesque cousin. I ponder my looks in the bathroom mirror. A few more wrinkles and gray hairs, but still resilient, still here. 

Door County is the place where I began looking for love—and finding it—in my marriage. It’s where one summer I came around the bend to see Margaret running full speed during a game of Ghosts in the Graveyard, her long legs gazelle-like against a dusky sky. It’s where Graydon lives his best life, eating barbeque chicken and corn on the cob, and staying up late talking to the adults. 

It’s where I began considering a change at work. It’s where last summer I studied for exams I would later pass, and where this year, I contemplated when to begin my next designation. It’s where, as the days go by, I stop blowdrying my hair and putting on makeup. It’s where I return to self. Myself. 

It’s also where Mike and I enjoyed a long date night. We ate nachos on a patio near a man with an accordion. His music took us across decades and time zones to Rome, Paris, and LA. We giggled with each opening chord, wondering how one decides to become an accordionist, and wondering still, how one selects such an eclectic line up. Later, we watched the sun over the harbor and ate Cedar Crest ice cream on a bench while admiring a rare 1964 Lincoln Continental. Even later, we played cards at a bar. Mike beat me nine times out of ten, as has been the case since we played Rummy on our honeymoon. And don’t get me started on Scrabble. 

Mike and I do Door County very, very well. It’s why we know we would make terrific locals, though July in Door County has a slightly different feel than, say, January. Minor details, I think.

At home again, I try to capture the sentiment, replicating my long walks and bike rides, intentional time with family, and leisurely meals made with the garden’s gifts. It never takes too long before I’m thrust back into work and activities and the pace of life shifts again. 

In truth, I don’t know how to balance it all, don’t know how to be me and work me, Door County Laura and home Laura. I don’t know how to make progress on writing and painting and gardening while also making progress at work. To some the answer is obvious. Just prioritize one or the other, or heck, even both. Make a decision and move on. 

But to me, the act of choosing who to be and how to spend my time, is less black-white, and more push-pull. 

When I was younger I watched a lot of The Christopher Lowell show. Whether his sunny personality or igniting “You can do it!” tagline, I was hooked. Christopher taught his audience that they were capable of anything. He interviewed everyday people like Linda the seamstress or Nancy the decoupager. Christopher told Nancy, “You know, there’s decoupage, and then there’s decoupage. Sometimes it can look a little crafty, but yours is very sophisticated and very beautiful.” I nodded along sagely, believing I knew exactly what he meant, and very much wanting my decoupage to earn his approval.

I would later make a very large paper mâché ant for a third grade project. I knew Christopher would find it sophisticated and definitely not crafty, despite its pipecleaner legs. 

Watching these greats taught me the correct—ahem, only—way to fold bath towels:  in half, then in thirds. Mike still folds bath towels in half and in half again. But then again, he was watching He-Man in the third grade, not Christopher and Martha, like me.

Their shows are where I first heard words like patina and poach, laminate and prune. It’s where I saw shadow boxes filled with tiny silver spoons and learned to care for flowers (Hyacinths! Sweet Peas! Hydrangeas!). 

Third grade Laura never knew that Christopher Lowell was intentionally over the top, never saw the SNL spoof that meant the real Christopher had truly made it. Childhood Laura could also never foresee Martha’s five-month incarceration. Or later, her partnership with Snoop Dogg.

All I knew was that watching Martha and Christopher while sprawled out on the living room rug was like stepping into a world where art like writing and painting and gardening was not just showcased, but esteemed. 

I learned there were places where soft skills, hospitality and thrift, ingenuity and care, had value. That tromping in boots to the garden to bring the outside in—whether celadon eggs or waxy sweet peas, or ruddy, mud-spackled potatoes—was not just a vacation activity, but an everyday joy. 

Somewhere between rag-rolling stripes on my bedroom wall in elementary school and living my adult life, I misconstrued Christopher’s “You can do it!” message. I pushed myself towards on-paper pursuits:  passing tests and making money, paying bills and working, working, working.

I forgot that the life I lead on vacation is not so distant from the life I led as a child, outside and dirty, collecting mosquito bites and wildflowers. 

I forgot to celebrate the subtler achievements of making art, if for nothing else than for the sake that it makes me happy.

In truth, I let the world encroach on who I want to be. 

Zora Neale Hurston said, “There are years that ask questions and years that answer.” I suppose in some sense, this is a questioning year. 

Perhaps by plodding along thoughtfully, messily, I will find myself having arrived in Door County in a season of answers. 

What I do know is that finding this balance, maintaining the self instead of forcibly returning to it, is important to me. 

It’s why I pushed myself in Door County to jump off a pier into 60 degree water (Ready! Set! Jump!). Or to slowly, painfully, bike Wisconsin hills while spandex-clad septuagenarians whizzed by me on road bikes. 

It’s why I sit here today, forcing myself to write despite seemingly more important tasks.

People often think of the years following college graduation as a time when the world stretches languidly in front of you, asking without offering advice just one question:  What do you want?

The question still needles, except this time, my material needs are met, my social circles secure. I’m no longer throwing a dart board at a map. I know where my feet are. 

What do you want? A voice asks again and again.

I think back to the sunsets and fields, time with family and friends, of moving my body and taking risks. 

This, I answer. Celadon eggs and artistic mistakes—though there’s a reason rag-rolling died with the 90s—drippy ice cream and sticky s’mores. 

But perhaps most important of all, I want a fervent belief in Christopher’s words, “You can do it!” 

I want to trust that there’s merit in art for art’s sake, to know that softer skills, when carefully cultivated, bear fruit. 

And I want to believe that the water, freezing though it may be, will catch me when I take that terrifying, brave leap.

Ready…set…jump!