MATT BURKHARTT
photojournalist

Summer is the feeling of hot blacktop on the soles of your feet, the timeless sound of the ice cream truck and, the smell of freshly cut grass. Summer is when nostalgic childhood memories are created. For Allie Martin, 9 and her sister Katie Martin, 12, of Shelburne Falls, summer is the time that they are reunited with their friend Brianna George, 11, of Fort Greene, Brooklyn as they have been for the last six summers by way of the Fresh Air Fund.

Sharing a home, a bedroom, and a bathroom with a friend is unlike biking down the block to your friend’s house and returning home at dinnertime; it resembles a sisterhood that has a natural ebb and flow. From July 8 to 15 this summer, Brianna rejoined the Martin family, but to Katie and Allie, she was more than a friend, she was their sister.

The Fresh Air Fund program’s vacations in the Northeast countryside, as well as in Ontario, Canada, provides New York City children with a respite from the din of urban life, free of charge. Families from New York City can enroll their child in the program who will stay with a family from the countryside for a week or longer.

For Jen Martin, the mother of Allie and Katie, the idyllic countryside her family enjoys every day as the place they call home is something worth sharing.

After residing in Chicago for about five years, where Jen Martin worked in an adult literacy program, she and her husband Doug Martin witnessed the struggle parents have - especially single parents - who needed summer child care. They felt volunteering as a Fresh Air Fund host family would fill a need and provide an enriching experience for not only their own children, but a child from the city as well.

At the end of the Martins’ first summer with Brianna six summers ago, they knew something very special had begun.

“Just seeing them play together and having so much fun together, and learning double dutch from her, the way they were so comfortable together, why wouldn't we want to continue that relationship?” Jen Martin said.”It just seemed like a no brainer, she just fit in really well with them.”

By design, the Fresh Air Fund helps expand the world kids live in and the breadth of their experiences with others, which Mrs. Martin acknowledged the significance of.

“It’s important for me for Katie and Allie to realize there’s a world beyond Shelburne Falls.”

She continued to say that while Brianna comes from a place that stands in stark contrast to Shelburne Falls, there is something universal about kids playing together.

“For the most part,there aren’t a lot of differences,” she said. It's just kids being kids and playing together and hanging out.”

Shaunda George, Brianna George’s mother, attended the Fresh Air Fund camp in Upstate New York as a child and wanted Brianna and her two siblings to experience life outside Brooklyn as well.

“When you actually get to go away and see something different from what you're used to, it changes your way of thinking in regards to life,” she said. “You see that the world is much bigger, so I think that Brianna actually has that experience of knowing that.”

Despite having spent a part of the last six summers with the Martins, Brianna’s urban upbringing has left her with an indelible partiality for the perpetually illuminated life in a city where she and the two and a half million human beings she shares Brooklyn with enjoy a comfortable position in the food chain.

“I prefer lights because sometimes you never know what's out there. There will be bears out there sometimes. You never know if it comes in the day or night,” explained Brianna.

Ms. George explained that while Brianna’s peers may think kids jumping off docks into placid lakes and docile bears sauntering past people’s homes are just fictional realities of rural life created by television, Brianna will be able to assert, “You know, bears really walk by a person’s home.”

“I feel like once she gets older she won't have a problem stepping out and wanting to go to the countryside to stay, to visit,” she said.

Ms. George said for people who have spent their lives in the city, they may be disinclined to leave the clamor of the streets of metropolitan New York - the city that never sleeps - for countryside like Western Massachusetts, where quietness, airborne insects and the darkness of night are all part of everyday life.

“I feel like it is a form of education, but I also feel like it's going to help her in the long run to grow as a person,” she said.

Summer can feel as if it’s is never ending, and its conclusion - like the period at the end of the final sentence of a great novel - is bittersweet. Like the friendship Allie, Katie and Brianna share, summer is cyclical. As Allie Martin pointed out, “We know that next year, we’ll see her again. It’s not very teary.”

For Brianna, leaving Massachusetts each summer means returning home to one family, but saying goodbye to another.

“It makes me feel happy because I get to see my family and sad because I’m leaving them (the Martins) because they're like my family too.”

After spending six summers together, the girls have built a friendship that has defined their summer vacations. While it is difficult to prophesize the future of their relationships, Mrs. Martin hopes the Fresh Air Fund will prove to be the catalyst for a shared bond that will endure for years to come.

“The nice thing with the Fresh Air Fund is the relationship over the years. They've kind of grown up together and just really gotten to know Brianna. I hope that as they grow into their teenage years, their interests will continue to mesh. It's hard to predict the future.”