You look forward to the day the last bell of the year rings and school lets out, freeing you of the routine you have been circling around in for the last nine and a half months. The days of getting out of bed at seven a.m. won’t resume for three months, and that means awaiting the day you dust off the top left drawer of your small dresser; the one with the bikinis. You are the biggest procrastinator, but not when it comes to packing for this week. You spend hours washing, rolling, and stuffing your suitcase full of every t-shirt, bikini, and pair of shorts in your room. You unzip and stuff more clothing into your suitcase at least five more times in the week before you leave. There are three more bags sitting beside your suitcase on the floor of your room. One bag for the beach, one filled with paint supplies, and another with the clothes that didn’t fit in your suitcase.Â
You sit waiting for your parents to get home from work and sit on their king bed as they pack their things; you get your procrastinating from them. When it is time to leave, you are the first in the family to load your bags into the car and the first to get into their seat. You ask to play the soundtrack of Lemonade Mouth and your parents chuckle and agree. The whole ride you stare out the open window to feel the breeze in your hair, waiting until you smell the crisp salty air of the bay. You always sleep on long car rides, but not this one. You reach the bridge leaving the mainland just as the sky is painted in the pinks and oranges you have only dreamed about. The whole thing feels like magic.
The beach town is the most beautiful place you have ever been. The massive houses painted white and gray with an occasional yellow or blue are lined with hydrangeas of every color. You wave at the people sitting on their balconies, and they smile and wave back. You have had to pee the entire drive, but you have forgotten in the excitement of almost being there. Your head still hangs out the window, allowing you to reach out and almost touch the pink convertible sitting somewhere on Asbury Ave.Â
As you pull in the driveway, the automatic lights turn on, placing a spotlight on the back porch where your aunt and uncle sit playing their word search games. You jump out of the car, sprint up the stairs, run through the house, and almost knock them over as you land in their lap. They put their iPads down and wrap their arms around you for the first time since Christmas. A few minutes later, your parents walk out on the porch and pull a chair beside them as you run to start unpacking. Your room is the one in the back of the house with a door to the back porch. It is painted pastel yellow with a bed for you and one above it for your sister. Your pictures hang on a hook beside the door, claiming it as yours. You sit on the back porch with your family for hours, laughing, playing games, and having the best time. The next thing you know, it is after midnight and time for bed. Your aunt walks you to your room and tucks you under the covers, where you lie awake waiting for the sound of the alarm telling you it is time for a day at the beach.Â
Your weeks spent at the house are always the best weeks of the year. After hours in the ocean with your uncle, you make dinner with your aunt and play volleyball or bike around the block until the adults are finished cleaning up. Nights there are an assortment of boardwalk rides, mini golf, walks to get ice cream, firework shows, and game nights. As you get older, the other houses get bigger and brighter, and your house gets new furniture and upgraded appliances, but the week at the beach never changes. Although your aunt and uncle aren’t at the house anymore, being there still fills your heart with so much joy. Now that you are old enough to plan your own vacations, you have gotten to share your happy place with your closest friends. With the amount you talk about this place, your friends feel like they have been there before. They don’t cherish it like you do. To them, it is just another vacation home, but it isn’t that to you. Each trip to the house brings you new memories and emotions you didn’t realize you could have, reidentifying it as your happiest place.Â
A happy place means something different to everyone. For many, it is a place they feel safe and loved or a place they are relaxed and carefree. This place could even be an everyday space that provides a temporary sanctuary. People are often attached to places with cherished memories inside that give them a joyous moment of nostalgia. Maybe this place is where they have the most fun and feel the freest, or maybe it is where the internet isn’t found for miles and work does not exist. When everyday life seems to be too much and we feel surrounded, it is common to escape to a happy place. An imaginary place, a physical one far away, or the arms of a loved one seem to slow all that is scrambling around in our minds. Whenever I feel too congested, I close my eyes and take myself to my happy place where the waves are crashing a block away and the air smells like fresh sea salt.Â