AUGUST 22, 2026 – My dad once said of Björnholm, “It gives me great satisfaction knowing it exists, even when I’m not able to be there.” Today, I recalled that statement while I worked in my makeshift “shipyard” on shore and Beth, Byron’s family, our guests, and Jenny and my niece, who’d wandered over from the old cabin down to the Red Cabin, were lounging and visiting on the pontoon anchored 100 feet out from the end of the dock. Every couple of minutes I’d look up from my makeshift workbench and glance at the pontoon crowd before making another cut or drilling another hole on my next set of five model sailboats (which will bring the fleet to 15). Though I’d chosen not to be among the loungers, I could hear the laughter of our three-year-old grandson and the occasional squeaks and squeals of our infant granddaughter—along with the chatter of the grown-ups. Their presence gave me great satisfaction, I thought, even when I’m not immediately among them.
I have a schedule to keep with my model sailboats—anticipated visitors to the Red Cabin, plus friends who every summer for years in a row took a multi-day charter sailing cruise Down East before visiting here but can’t do either this year because of serious health issues; plus another special recipient of a model sailboat—a critical individual in my life, about whom I shall write in due course. This afternoon I made substantial progress on this next set of five boats, due in large part, ironically, to my having stayed ashore.
Eventually, however, I had to break my isolation from the group. I pulled a kayak down into the water and paddled out to the mother ship. Everyone was in a generous mood and we exchanged cheerful greetings. On the far side of the pontoon, I saw our daughter-in-law comfortably seated, with one arm around her content “smiley girl” infant and the hand of her other arm holding up a book. In planning the family’s extended vacation here at the Red Cabin, she’d announced two desires: to read two books. At the one-week mark, she’d finished reading her first book, Alentejos Blue by Monica Ali. I was happy to see her reading well into her second book. Without asking her, I couldn’t confirm the title—all of our guests are readers (in several different languages); among the books lying around inside the cabin, I don’t know which book goes with which guest. I paddled on.
Earlier, Byron and Kumar had propelled our two-person paddleboat out and tied it onto the cruise ship. Now they seated three-year-old D. in one of the storage wells on the back of the paddleboat and took him for a little excursion in big circles around the pontoon. He was enjoying himself thoroughly, like a Mughal prince, I thought, aboard a Takht-i-Ravan on Dal Lake in the magical Vale of Kashmir. For a few precious moments, Grindstone Lake became a dream, and my kayak transformed itself into the shikara that over a fortnight I paddled many times on Dal Lake.
As the sun reclined, I returned to shore in my kayak, and Byron skippered the pontoon back to the dock, where we tied it up for easy disembarking and simple embarkation again for a later post-dinner cruise.
The next order of the day’s proceedings was homemade pizza. By the time Byron and I had finished cutting up fuel for the evening’s campfire, the rest of the crew was actively engaged in a “cabin experience par excellence.” It also bordered on happy bedlam.
The adults were quite advanced in their pizza crust work and administration of toppings. D., on the other hand, was on his way to becoming a pretzelmeister. A moment too late I noticed him pulling his left fist out of a large bag of flour and dropping the white powder onto the pre-existing mountain of flour on the island counter in front of him. His efforts thus far had liberally dusted his face—and the seat of his chair and the bare pine floor surrounding his chair—with Pillsbury Best All Purpose Flour. When I started slipping on the floor as if it were made of slippery tiles greased with olive oil, I decided to get ahead of the clean-up curve: The other grown-ups were having way too much fun to worry about it. I reveled, though, in the sight and sounds of their amusement.
After the pizzas went into the oven, I tried to keep track of the multiple conversations—one about books, another rather heated discussion about AI, and yet another about . . . the pizzas . . . with kid noise arcing over the whole scene. It was a delicious cacophony.
I enjoyed every aspect of it, for I knew how many months had passed when silence had reigned in and around the Red Cabin and Björnholm—and how soon the usual quietude would return; and how I would miss the joy that everyone present brings to this place.
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© 2026 by Eric Nilsson
