South Haven: I just can't say goodbye

Call me sentimental, prone to nostalgia, slow to let go of what/who has meant something to me. I am all those things. During my days in South Haven in August, for the first time in thirty-one years, the question, “Is it time to let go of my August South Haven tradition?” crept into my consciousness. For thirty-one years, South Haven has been my happy place. And I felt happy there this time as well, but … but what? I’m not sure. My sentimental attachments make this a difficult question to ponder.

Every street, every shop, every restaurant, every inch of both beaches and both piers hold many memories. The year I rented a cottage so poorly built, we could see daylight between the floor and the back wall. When my sister dropped off my young niece and nephew to spend a few days with me, bless her heart, she stayed long enough to wash black mold off the walls. When the kids left, friends arrived for a few days. Other friends and my husband have joined me in B&Bs and cottages and motels and campgrounds over the years. One summer I was thrilled to share my happy place with my parents; and it turned out to be perhaps the last summer my dad would have been able to take a trip. One August a group of friends had fun watching the Blueberry Festival parade and going to concerts by the river. Oh so many glorious sunrise beach walks, ice cream indulgences, refreshing lake breezes, foam-rubber Frisbee games on sandbars, and glowing lighthouse photos in thirty-one years.

Since my novel is partially set in “sparkling South Haven,” in 2008 a bookstore there invited me to have a book-signing event on their sidewalk. It poured rain all day, but mobs of vacationers were all smiles. They sat down at my little table, leaned in, and told how they had fallen in love with South Haven once and kept coming back, buying houses there, making family memories, and extending summer vacations there from one week to two to three to four. I shared my story of falling in love with South Haven with everyone who stopped, too. I don’t think I sold a book, but I packed up my little table display with a big smile on my face and joy in my heart.

Every year I feel nostalgia for the South Haven of the 1980s when a string quartet played beautiful music for people waiting outside a popular breakfast restaurant in a Victorian mansion. Now it is townhouses and a parking lot. To my knowledge, none of today’s SoHa eateries even serves local blueberries in their breakfasts, as that rambling restaurant once did. South Haven is proud to be “Blueberry Capital of the World,” but in the height of blueberry (and peach) season this August, we were served melon and pineapple from God knows where with our breakfast.

The changes I’ve seen over the years are too numerous to count. I suppose upon first noticing each change, I felt a little twinge of regret, but many if not most changes have been positive, and the town is still vibrant. People still smile a lot. Strangers are still friendly. Locals and vacationers still come down to the waterfront to watch the sun set behind South Haven’s iconic red lighthouse. South Haven still speaks “summer” to my heart.

This summer, however, three changes may push me toward letting go of my annual pilgrimage. (Note: I cannot bring myself to say I have decided.) One is that the locally made ice cream I look forward to all year is no longer being made. This might seem trivial, but to me it’s kind of a big deal. The tradition is walking down to the pier with Sherman’s ice cream to watch the sun set. I don’t eat ice cream the rest of the year, and Sherman’s is really really good. We did watch the sunset this year without ice cream, and it didn’t kill me, so I can probably adjust to this disappointment.

Secondly, high water levels of Lake Michigan have swallowed up all long-beach-walk sections of the beach. Now the beach is so narrow that a beach walk cannot be a free-feeling, arm-swinging long stride with eyes on the horizon. It’s more of a watch-every-step, arms-out-to-balance-yourself as you gingerly navigate what is really just the steep base of the dunes. Thirdly, South Haven’s popularity has finally priced us out of acceptable lodging. To pay $$$ a night for substandard motel accommodations a mile from town takes away considerable enjoyment.

I’ve been to a lot of nice towns in my adult life without ever feeling the connection I feel to South Haven. I can’t imagine a summer without South Haven. Having a happy place seems important enough in this acrimonious age that perhaps I could start planning now what not to spend money on this year so that next summer we can afford to rent a house or a condo with a deck or other outdoor space. Not sure how to replace those rejuvenating beach walks, but maybe I can figure this out, too. I would sure be sad to say goodbye to South Haven.