Sometime during the summer of 1961 I went back to Wisconsin with my parents and grandparents and maybe an aunt and uncle or two. This time we went to Arbor Vitae and I guess I went fishing if the picture to the left is to be believed. I also have video footage of that trip. My grandparents must have liked Arbor Vitae, because many of their early videos are taken there.

I don’t remember this second visit to Wisconsin either, although I do remember an incident shortly after we returned. My grandmother was cutting my hair and noticed a tick had buried its head in my scalp. She used the lit end of her cigarette to make it back out, then crushed it between her fingernails, causing blood (my blood) to ooze over her fingertips. She said that the tick probably got in my hair in Wisconsin. You can imagine why I remember this incident.

It turns out that Arbor Vitae is not too far away from Hazelhurst, the town in which my parents have a lake house. Not long ago my parents took me back to a bar that they used to go to in Arbor Vitae. It looks pretty much the same as in the videos – or maybe all Wisconsin bars look the same.