E.B. White once wrote about his return to a lake in Maine where he’d spent many childhood summers: It was as if “the years were a mirage, and there had been no years.” When we arrived, it was all just as I’d remembered: the crunch of the gravel in the driveway, the immediate sweet smell of sap and pine that hits when you first step outside the car, the print newspapers lined up for guests in the Main Lodge, their owners’ last names scrawled, always, in green markers. There was no Wi-Fi in the cabins; the water was still spring fed. Jane — the resort’s formidable owner, Jane Orans — “does not like change,” a fellow guest reminded me.

Neither does my family, it turns out. Every year for the past 10 years, summer after summer, we have packed up the car, debated whether to take the scenic route or the faster one, and driven all the way back to Quisisana, where we know, once we arrive, we will eat oatmeal cookies at the counter in the main lodge; the kids will peel off while my husband and I nap; and we will eventually wander over to the cabins of old friends who always come the week we do, to ask how their drive went. There will be time, plenty of time, to catch up on more important matters, and on even less important ones, on long days by the lake. There will be Maine lobster on Thursday night and blueberry pie on Saturday. All will be as it should be.