On The Road Again

And now our adventure ends, for there is an ending to everything under God's heavens.

My apologies for the lack of accompanying photographs, but once I get back to my home town I'll sort through the roughly 200+ photos I took and post some ocean shots.  We were quite fortunate insofar as it appeared to have rained the day we arrived at the ocean, on Thursday the 8th, but the rest of the time it was clear, beautiful and sunny.  The temperatures never did fall below about 50, and the highs were in the 60s. Altogether, a beautiful journey, my wife had a very nice birthday (and I had a very nice surprise!) but, alas, as I write this at 8:45 Monday morning, it is time to leave.

Each time I get here, I find it more and more difficult to leave.  I have gotten to grow quite fond of this very small town of about 4,000 people.  Once a heavy fishing and logging town, those years are far behind though it tries to capitalize on them whenever possible.  It has always managed to endure through hard times and, yet while it has expanded a bit, it has never encountered what one would term an explosion of population.  That is both good and bad.  Good for the residents, bad for its economy.  The town has many shuttered businesses in its downtown area and, with the current economy what it is, the business people are suffering more.  Unemployment is high.  Since now and May of 2008, the last time we visited, even more businesses are gone.  Restaurants have changed although that in and of itself is encouraging.  At least they're not all gone completely.

The town is, in general, liberal in leaning and yet rife with blue collar workers as well.  There still are fishermen left.  There still is a small harbor replete with multiple fishing boats that still fish.  It has a foghorn at the harbor mouth, red and green marker buoys in the channel.  There is a Coast Guard presence for a real purpose.  It is a town packed with real people unlike, in my opinion, its sister tourist town, Mendocino.  Mendocino is, don't get me wrong, a gorgeous and quaint little town.  But, to me, though gorgeous, it's false.  Too cute, unreal.  Everyone on vacation wants to go there and that is fine with me.  

The ocean has its grip on me as well.

As I write, a small black bird stands on the wooden railing along with his pal, a brown seagull.  Both are awaiting whatever I might spare: some bread, maybe a crumpled potato chip.

It the meantime, the waves crash, the rollers coming in a predictable and awesome series, never stopping.  Simply crashing.  Continuously.  It's a stunning and gorgeous sight and I feel I could never tire of the sound.  The waves and the sounds are, to me, hypnotizing, mesmerizing.

I could just sit and watch the ocean, just watch it, listen to it, and never tire of it.

If I had my millions, I'd drop everything I was doing and buy a small home directly adjacent the sea, so I could watch and listen to my friend.

Time to go.  Checkout time is here.  Time to pack the car.

A very heavy sigh, this time.  

An ending.

BZ