Halibut Point
Oct. 16th, 2004 01:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
susanstinsonTomorrow is my birthday. I'll be 44 in 04. I want that to mean something beautiful about balance.
In honor of this, my love took off from work yesterday to drive me to Halibut Point on Cape Ann – or, that's where we ended up. We were looking for ocean in a slightly uninformed way, like the raised-in-Colorado-landlocked-folks we still are, no matter how many years we've lived in Massachusetts (for me, it's more than twenty). She brought skis because she wanted to try to ski on the beach (she saw it on tv), but we ended up with rocks, not sand, which might be for the best. Halibut Point is a state park at the site of an old quarry, and there was still water there, and a huge pile of discarded broken rock above the beach, which she climbed. We walked through low, scrubby red vines and sharp grass to reach smooth flat rocks where the waves were hitting hard. In her purple windbreaker and black sweats, she went further than me, bending to look, she told me later, for life in the tide pools. There wasn't any. I sat on damp rock close enough to the water for my face to get wet and took a few notes on the back of a receipt for Portuguese wine, which was all I had for paper.
She had driven for hours, and drove hours more home, in heavy traffic. This was generous, especially since she drives for a living, delivering mail. The water was green at the edges, dark gray and choppy farther out. The fog was thick. The waves hit again and again with stately fierceness, a repetitive lift and dissolution. The spray rose high and fell in planes over the rocks. Oh, love. Her outline was sturdy but on the verge of possible trouble as she leaned so low to pockets of quiet water.
In honor of this, my love took off from work yesterday to drive me to Halibut Point on Cape Ann – or, that's where we ended up. We were looking for ocean in a slightly uninformed way, like the raised-in-Colorado-landlocked-folks we still are, no matter how many years we've lived in Massachusetts (for me, it's more than twenty). She brought skis because she wanted to try to ski on the beach (she saw it on tv), but we ended up with rocks, not sand, which might be for the best. Halibut Point is a state park at the site of an old quarry, and there was still water there, and a huge pile of discarded broken rock above the beach, which she climbed. We walked through low, scrubby red vines and sharp grass to reach smooth flat rocks where the waves were hitting hard. In her purple windbreaker and black sweats, she went further than me, bending to look, she told me later, for life in the tide pools. There wasn't any. I sat on damp rock close enough to the water for my face to get wet and took a few notes on the back of a receipt for Portuguese wine, which was all I had for paper.
She had driven for hours, and drove hours more home, in heavy traffic. This was generous, especially since she drives for a living, delivering mail. The water was green at the edges, dark gray and choppy farther out. The fog was thick. The waves hit again and again with stately fierceness, a repetitive lift and dissolution. The spray rose high and fell in planes over the rocks. Oh, love. Her outline was sturdy but on the verge of possible trouble as she leaned so low to pockets of quiet water.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 01:53 pm (UTC)Also, happy birthday!
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 06:55 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 02:20 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 06:56 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 02:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 06:57 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 02:54 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 06:57 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 09:04 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 06:58 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 09:09 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 06:58 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 09:57 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 06:58 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 10:44 pm (UTC)have a joyful, sweet day. it's been grand getting to know you this year!
:-*
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 06:59 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-16 11:26 pm (UTC)Happy Birthday!!!! I feel honored to have gotten to know you a little this year. I'm so glad you're a writer and that you got on this weird LJ thing. Yay!
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 07:00 am (UTC)Yeah, all said and done, I'm glad I'm a writer, too, And I love lj more than is good for me, but what's life without vices?
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-17 12:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 07:01 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-17 12:40 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 07:01 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-17 09:04 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 07:02 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-17 12:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 07:03 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-17 02:50 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 07:03 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 06:28 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 07:04 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 08:21 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 09:04 am (UTC)This is beautiful.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-18 01:41 pm (UTC)i especially liked the last line of what you write here - really evokes image and/or feeling for me *smile*
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-24 11:23 am (UTC)Thanks for this lovely window into your day.
If you ever make it to my neck of the woods, and with enough notice, I'll bake a cake. Birthday cake... its not just for birthdays anymore.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-10-27 11:53 am (UTC)