08/22/98

It was a beautiful Saturday, warm and sunny with a soft breeze to stir the hair and keep the brow cool. Perfect, we said to each other, let's go to the beach! And so we packed up the dog and some beer and sandwiches and toodled off to the shore. Up and over and down the twisty highway we went, breathing in the pungent scents of hay and horses and late summer flowers as the road wound towards the sea. The sun had baked the coastal hills bronze and gold wherever the deep green lines of pine and oak petered out along the ridges. Brightly clad bicyclists spun along in the right lane. Motorcyclists roared past on the way to La Honda. We pondered the wisdom of anyone who would build up in the hills accessible only by such narrow, curving roads. On the far side of Skyline Drive we passed evidence of the long, wet winter's mudslides. The lower valleys soon spread wide along either side of us, thick with strawberry plants, pumpkin and squash, peas and lettuce and asparagus. As we descended the last five miles to the coast we saw the first tendrils of fog.

At the beach we ate our sandwiches and drank our beer and walked our dog under a light blanket of summer fog. No sunlight sparkled on the green water as it broke and hissed and ran foaming along the pale sand. Adolescent brown seagulls circled overhead or clustered along the water's edge. Children made sand dragons and dug holes while wearing sweatshirts. We put on our denim jackets and went to explore the cliffs. Crab legs and sand dollars were our booty, seaweed and mussels our reward. The dog was wary of the ocean and galloped away at the merest touch of a wave. After a couple of hours we hopped back in the car and drove up to Half Moon Bay where the inland road brought us back to sunlight on golden fields and sprawling acres of flowers nodding and fluttering in the breeze. A hot wind carried the sound of buzzing insects to punctuate our conversation. As we rolled down the highway towards home, cheeks sunburned despite the fog, summer settled in our bones.