Everyone has childhood memories. Mine seem to be stored
under various categories in my brain. Maybe yours are the same way. Some
memories are like still-shot photographs, some are longer scenes or
conversations, some are feelings or emotions I had at the time, some are even
familiar smells connected to belongings or homes. All of these ways of
remembering have one thing in common: a story that is attached to them. What’s odd is that some stories are spurred
on by memories and some memories are spurred on by stories told to you. This is
one of the latter.
A story I have heard many times, mostly from my Mema, but
from other family members as well, is the story of the addition of the pool at
the Atlantis Lodge. The story goes like this:
Mema asked Pops if he would
consider building a pool. Her main reason being that her only 2 grandchildren
at the time (myself and my sister) would really enjoy playing in a pool. Mema
herself loved to swim as well. It was one of her childhood hobbies. She wanted
us to benefit from a quieter place to enjoy the water when the ocean of the
Crystal Coast seemed too big. So, Pops objected at first saying there was not
enough room in the brush between the two parking lots. Until one day he came
into the kitchen and quietly proclaimed, “Ya know, I think there is just enough
room in there for a nice sized pool.” He had gone out into the brush and
measured it himself. It wasn’t too long after that we were able to swim in the
pool that is there today, complete with all of surrounding trees that Pops was
smart enough to keep and its self-circulating waterfall to keep the baby pool
refreshing. I was in the pool for the very first
time and, as I have heard the story told to me, I asked, “Why are all these
people in my pool!?”.
As a two and a half-year-old, I couldn’t understand the
concept of the hotel and all of its surroundings not being at my personal
disposal. It’s what makes the story funny.
I have many other
memories in that pool, years and years of them. (As I am now 32 and have girls
of my own who swim in it.) The ironic thing is that, beyond that story, all of
my memories of being at the hotel involve me feeling the presence of a very
grown-up concept: hospitality. I learned at a very early age that “what is mine
is yours.” I learned this because it was modeled before me. Generations of
hospitality-minded people who constantly gained joy from sharing what they had
were now able to share that same heart with me, my parents, aunts, uncles, sister
and cousins. At every age I have known that everyone staying at the hotel is a
friend. Everyone is invited to come around for a snack or for dinner. Come, sit in the shade with us. Come, laugh
with us. The more the merrier. I hope I can make your Atlantis memories as special as you have made mine.
Atlantis Lodge is a premier oceanfront hotel on the
Crystal Coast that is pet friendly. A boutique hotel located in Pine Knoll
Shores on the Southern Outer Banks, it has been called a “true treasure”.
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