A summer day

When I was 12 I was in the mountains spending my summer holidays at my cousins´house. We were spending the hot afternoon in a pond near the house. We were paddling in an old boat made from a tree to cross the water from one side to the other, we avoided to get near the intake gate a place that could have sucked us in very quick, it was thrilling to feel the fear about that. As we spent our time there I suddenly saw that the day was brighter than usual, all the leaves were greener and the sky seemed bluer. I felt suddenly the need to stay afar from the others and walked slowly barefoot on the ground. I felt a strange emotion of happiness and sadness, a feeling of belonging to the earth and to that place, a place I have always remembered and that I have never returned to again.