I’m posting photos from my collection each Saturday along with a brief explanation of what I know about the picture.

This week, a photo of Yours Truly beating the heat at the cottage by floating on an inflatable mattress in the lake. My family never owned a cottage but for several years my parents rented a cottage on Lake Couchiching, north of Toronto, Ontario. The lake was the centre of daily activities – swimming, splashing, exploring, and at least one year, fishing with my paternal grandfather.

The inflatable air mattress was always my favourite ‘toy’. In addition to being a great place to relax, it served as an imaginary pirate ship or sometimes a raft drifting down a river to adventure. It was also central to a ‘dunk the person on the raft’ game the whole family seemed to enjoy.

I suspect that the photo was taken, around 1962, by my father as he was usually the parent who handled the ‘technology’ in the family.

Yours Truly beats the heat on an inflatable air mattress, about 1962