Be Young, Be Foolish

It was still windy when I awoke on Tuesday morning, our first full day here in Atlantic Beach, 15 minutes before sunrise.  We don’t set alarms out here (unless there is a race the next morning) or spend much time looking at clocks – “Living on Beach Time,” as T-shirts and cocktail napkins like to advertise in local shops.  No matter how thick the shades are, first light seems to creep past them, and if you sleep until sunrise it is banging loudly at the windows.

I went out the walkway in 20 mph wind, temperature in the upper 30s, for my first morning Tai Chi on the dune-top deck.  The walkway to the deck is much longer than you would expect before it leads ultimately to the sandy path between the dunes and the wide, wide beach, wider here than in any other oceanfront place we have stayed.  We have measured the distance and it must be a quarter mile from the building to the ocean.

In Highlands, I practice my morning Tai Chi most mornings on our deck, where conditions are always changing.  A week or two ago, I startled three deer browsing on the still-green grass between the apple trees.  But here before the ocean it is always special, the heavily-vegetated dunes on each side, the sound of the crashing surf ahead of me.  The beach is south-facing, one of the few places where you can watch sunrise and sunset from the same vantage point.  There was a deep purple layer of clouds on the horizon and the sun was somewhere behind that curtain in golden sunrise glory.

Straight ahead to the south, patches of clouds were picking up the rosy glow of sunrise, and all around the horizon, even to the west and north, the sky was tinged with the same color, as if the light was a sound reverberating all around.

My witty friend Morris wrote to me this weekend to tell me about his New Year’s Resolutions as a runner.  “This year seems like a good one so far.  After I run today I will have a string of running every day this year.  By the way, my New Year's resolution is to live forever.  So far I have kept that resolution.”  It occurred to me that I should resolve to watch sunrise over the ocean every morning.  So far I had a string of sunrises every day!

Martha had posted the first entry for “On the Blackboard” of the new year, and I thought it was especially appropriate for our Sabbatical time here.

We had done some provisioning yesterday on the way to the condo, but we needed to do some more today, and our first stop was Blue Ocean Market just over the causeway in Morehead City.  I love seeing the fresh fish lined up neatly on ice and to see on the board what is coming in today.  We will buy our shrimp, scallops, crab cake, and fresh fish here, but today we were looking for shrimp salad and cole slaw (for shrimp burgers).  Chef Jeremiah also posts instructional videos on his website showing how to prepare everything from Caribbean Mahi Mahi to soft shell crabs.

The wind had died down by afternoon and it was low tide, so we took our first walk down to the Oceanana Pier and back, about a mile to the west.  There is always something new to see on the beach – what the tide has washed in overnight, what shore birds are out and about or winging overhead – and we have never taken this walk, in any weather conditions, and not returned feeling renewed and refreshed in body, mind, and spirit.  We noticed immediately that some new benches had been installed just below the dunes, and there was a plaque on the one just outside our condo remembering Matt Cobb, who had died last year.  I noted that he was born the same year as I.

That verse rang a bell – “Be young, be foolish, but be happy!”  I have to believe that you can be young (and foolish, and happy) at the age of 72!  I vaguely remembered the Tams from the Sixties, and a visit to YouTube found a video of them performing their hit song of 1968, performing a dance routine reminiscent of the Temptations and so many other African-American musical groups of the era, and each of them seemed to be wearing . . . a tam?  Matt must have been a fan.

We began to spot some interesting shells!

 

Martha pointed out the shell holding a handful of sudsy water in the palm of its hand.  The sea star was especially nice – not as beautiful as the royal sea star we found last year,  but still relatively uncommon.  The horseshoe crab was covered with tiny barnacles of some kind.  And what was that curvy line of feathers doing stuck in the sand? – perhaps a child had gathered them and made a whimsical creation.

Two young women were doing the same thing as we, and had filled a plastic bucket to overfilling.  And what a treasure they had found, topped with four beautiful royal sea stars!  They said they had stumbled on them by accident, higher up on the beach.  There is a saying that you don’t find sea glass, it finds you, so perhaps the same rule applies to sea stars.

We returned with hearty appetites, and after awhile I plated up our appetizers – that delicious shrimp salad from Blue Ocean, and glasses of cold Sauvignon Blanc.  Martha spread our own humble collection of shells out for display – not bad for our first walk on the beach! – and we settled in to books and magazines and puzzles.

What a precious privilege it is to be alive!