The Outer Banks of North Carolina (known on sweatshirts and bumper stickers as OBX) is close enough that I should have visited long ago. But here I am now, which is all that really matters. It was a brisk welcome, sunny and cold, with wind that meant business and had busied itself burying the stairway to the beach.

Just a reminder of who’s in charge, as if we need it after Fiona and Ian. 

The dunes here are protected but diminished, and seeing them yesterday, proud seagrass waving, was to feel an ache for all the beautiful things that grace our lives … then disappear.