For eight straight summers, my mother told me there “just wasn’t enough room” for me and my two kids at her beach cottage while my sister

My mother called at 8:17 on a Monday morning, just as the last of my guests were checking out and the dining room staff were clearing the breakfast buffet.

The sun was already high over the water, bright enough to scatter diamonds across the Atlantic. Below my balcony, children from three different branches of my extended family were dragging rolling suitcases …