Calefaction and cooling

[Outside temperature reading: 102ºF; 3:30pm, 8/25/07]

I escaped the record-breaking heat (officially 96ºF in Boston, with higher heat indexes) by driving up to the New Hampshire seacoast yesterday afternoon, where it was about 15 degrees cooler, winds off the water. BTW, note that the thesaurus search for cooling turns up "sea breeze" as the third entry (after ceasefire and central AC). I stopped at the mall on the way up to the coast to try to find something to wear on a short business trip this week. I have one measly slide to present which will be over in less than three minutes, yet my system is already tensed for life-threatening assault three days in advance - such a bother. Anyway, even the mall air conditioning seemed to be having trouble keeping up. Ah but the beach...  I'd checked the tide schedule Friday night, so I knew it would be low tide and a long walk on hard-packed, wave-cooled sand would be waiting.

I have mixed feelings when I'm up at the coast. I think of how my parents loved it there and didn't want to move away. I see the places where I used to take my dogs, now both gone, to scamper on the beach in the off-season. My long walks from one stretch of the strand to the other and back were a refuge to me, a break from the emotional turbulence frequently occasioned by familial visits and intermixed with various love-life torments, all of which I'd ruminate on while pacing the wet sand. To go there brings all the sense-soothing qualities - fresh sea air on my skin and its smell and taste, the rhythmic snoring of waves and their brisk inrushing swells catching feet and legs and sometimes more - but it also wrenches loose what I thought I'd managed to wrestle down into safe little cubbyholes.

[Foss Beach, Rye, NH; 7:15pm, 8/25/07]

At dinnertime, I drove up Ocean Blvd in search of fish and chips and ended up at the venerable Ray's Seafood, which was overflowing but I found a seat at the bar upstairs. It was a bit noisy and packed full of locals watching the Red Sox beat the White Sox on the screen above the bar. I had a nice chat with an amiable barfly, who was probably around 70 years old, while I ate excellent fish and chips and drank my Smuttynose IPA. I know outsiders find New Englanders unfriendly, but baseball and beer does seem to make an exception in our reticence. In any case, having lived here all my life I guess I'm clued in to the subtle mores that serve as friendliness here, even outside of bars, and I felt at home.

After dinner, I crossed the street to where my car was parked along the rocks and climbed up to look at the rocky bay. A few people stood on the rocks watching the moon rise over the incoming tide, a middle-aged couple held hands, an older gentleman sat alone, a family with young children dressed for dinner were waiting for people to meet them there, a father and son threw pebbles at breaking waves. I sat for awhile listening to the tide pull and push the beach pebbles, throwing spray here and there. Then I got in my car and drove home.

Comments

[marja-leena]

That's hot! I feel the same way about ocean beaches - they are calming, even though at times old stuff keeps coming back. Hope your business trip goes well, Leslee!

[leslee]

Thanks, Marja-Leena!

[dave]

I like the bittersweet flavor of this post. Reminds me of that great little prose-poem you did for qarrtsiluni, Petey's.

[leslee]

Thanks, Dave. I intended to go to Petey's, but I couldn't get near the place. Better to go there in the off-season, and that odd - well, bittersweet, I think - feeling of a beach resort when left to the locals.