These photos appear to be from the summer of 1973 or 1974. It was around this time that the Weizeorick clan resumed vacations to the east coast. We bought the family van (background in first photo) and packed that fifteen passenger van with fourteen people and drove from Lisle, Illinois to Sea Isle City, New Jersey every summer for most of my life. Dad would spend the day before the trip jamming the tiniest of suitcases under the seats of the van. We shared a tiny suitcase with a sibling… at least the little kids did. Truth be told, we wore swimsuits for most of the time. Mom spent the day before the trip packing food for the drive. Never straying from a system that worked, Mom ALWAYS made hard boiled eggs with white bread for breakfast, sandwiches made on the road for lunch, and cold meatloaf sandwiches for dinner. I still love cold meatloaf sandwiches with catsup. In the beginning, the trips were in June for one week. Dad eventually said the one week was too short for the amount of work involved, and moved the vacation to two weeks in late July or early August. With one exception, we rented the same house on the beach for the entire run. We even rented this house with our kids long after my parents stopped going. 

On the first year, Mom and Dad were looking for the rental house, which was listed as the intersection of a numbered street and beach. They could not find Beach Street. Dad asked, “It couldn’t be on the actual beach, could it?” Since Mom didn’t know, they went and checked, and it was. Even though Mom did crazy amounts of laundry and cooking, she was in her zone at the beach house. Dad was happy too, bringing out his recorder. There was a steady stream of cousins from both sides of the family that visited each year. 

Family lore has it that John was once left at a rest stop. By the time it was discovered, the family was on the highway speeding away. Dad had to wait for an emergency turn around, head back, and wait for another emergency turn around to get back to the rest stop. I try to imagine the panic of this moment and feel sick whenever I do. I am not sure if this happened during the New Jersey trips, or the trips to the lake up north. Not to lose an opportunity, John befriended a nice couple, who must have thought his family was starving him, because he feasted on their picnic lunch. Maybe they thought he was making up this large, crazy family that he was telling them about. In any case, after that mishap, we all had to show our faces at Mom’s roll call after rest stops. Apparently, someone had said, “HERE” for John at the roll call, when he wasn’t there. Showing face was sometimes a pain. See, the littlest of kids (me) usually slept during the drive on the floors, which were covered with sleeping bags. We jammed down between the suitcases that Dad stuffed under the seats. When the people in the seat above us wanted to shift around, we were usually stepped on and kicked. The worst part about floor sleeping was that you couldn’t turn around without getting up above the seats, turning, and jamming back down facing the opposite direction, usually with one arm asleep because you slept on it too long on one side. With your face an inch or two away from the suitcases, you could only sleep on your side. I’m pretty sure this is why I am a bit claustrophobic. 

That shore house slept twelve if you only filled the beds and the sofa sleeper, but we loaded it with the fourteen of us and frequently visiting cousins and family. Sometimes the floor was covered with people, with extras sleeping on the porch. It was a top/bottom rental, but usually the family that owned the house was staying upstairs while we rented the downstairs. My memories are filled with groups of us playing on the beach and building epic sand cities. Mom was famous for taking a picture and then adding more and more people to get more bang for her buck in the photo. I included a series from one of those times. 

I am going to close out with a series of photos from over the years. Next week, we return to our usual antics, but I may revisit the old days one week a month.