The cool, crisp air filled my lungs while I stared into the moonlight. As I walked on the beach I felt the warm, salty tide hit my legs. The luminescent moon glistened off of the water. My mother shouted out into the night air: "Liam, it's time to go now!" I took one last look out at the water, abandoning it's temporary serenity in order to head to a place that brought me complete contentment--Driftwood.
My mother and I rolled into the entrance of the campsite in our gold town & country minivan. Little did she know, the bottom of the car scraped the curb, but she doesn't really pay those things much mind anyway. As we eased up to the entrance I looked up and read the sign "Driftwood: Camping Resort". That's when it occurred to me that this may be the last time I enter through here. It was almost some type of gateway to happiness for me. We approached the first stop sign and I remembered that the speed limit is 5 miles per hour in the campground. This triggered a memory from when I was a little kid. I would think to myself, "Wow, I can go faster than these cars on my feet right now!". I gained heaps of power and confidence just from knowing the speed limit. Being able to run faster than the cars on the dimly lit roads gave me great joy and happiness. .
Continuing on down the road we approached the infamous lake. We got closer and my eyes locked onto the rope dividing the each section of the water. Presumably one side of the lake was for fishing and the other swimming. Seeing this, my mind was flooded with another flashback. All I saw in my head was green murky water with seaweed and tiny fish swimming at my feet. I was wearing arm floaties so I must've been very young. This was the day my sister and I swam to the rope and touched it together: a feat unlike any other at Driftwood, in a way it was a rite of passage. Not only did this form a new kind of trust between my sister and I, it also taught me that you have to take risks in life.