There are stands of ancient hemlocks in New Germany State Park, an oasis of green trails and lofty heights. A cathedral of a forest.
I made my first trip to Florida at the age of 10. It took us three days to drive from Lexington to Miami.
It was January. We’d left the cold behind by day two of our drive, but even so the balminess of the Florida air was a surprise. It was nighttime when we finally pulled into our motel near Biscayne Bay, and the combination of darkness and sultriness has stayed with me all these years, potent memories of a place different from any other I’d visited.
Florida has changed drastically since then, but it retains that other-worldliness. Like the lush Northwest, Florida is its own place, and it’s a privilege to spend a week a year savoring its big sky, palm trees and sugar-sand beach. It’s a combination I’ve come to think of as scenic hospitality, and this morning, back in Virginia, I’m appreciating it all the more.
(A picket fence I walked by every morning on my way to the beach. It’s decorated with pineapples, the symbol of hospitality.)
I felt like a commuter walking against the throng. Everyone was leaving. I had missed the sunset, one of the chief entertainments around here.
Taking myself to task as I watched the darkening sky, I wished I’d spent less time searching through the t-shirts and trinkets.
But light was lingering in the west. I could still enjoy the afterglow. Which is what I did … and what I plan to do as this beach trip becomes another beautiful memory.
A walk by the sea provides its own ceaseless beat. In and out. Strike and pause. The rhythm of the surf is the rhythm of life, more or less.
As I’ve walked the strand these last few days, I’ve thought about family and friends, about how grateful I am for them — and how grateful I am for this time apart in which to appreciate them.
Just as a wave rolls to shore before being absorbed back into the ocean, so does all life pulse with this ebb and flow. We are not inert creatures but products of movement and motion.
I’ve got rhythm. We all do.
Storm chasers are bold (some would say foolish) folks who race to observe a hurricane or tornado. I’ve become just the opposite, a storm dodger. Afternoon showers are such a common occurrence here that I plan my days around them.
I walk the beach in the morning. At 3 p.m. I’m scanning the sky. Are those dark clouds forming in the west? How quickly are they moving? When do I leave the beach and head for shelter?
There’s an art to this. Depart too soon and I’ll miss out on precious time in the sun and surf. Leave too late and I’ll be drenched.
In fact, I’m writing this post while waiting for some storm clouds to pass so I can take a dip in the pool. Another day in the life of a storm dodger.
No insult intended, but all shade is not created equal. There is the thin stuff you find on a warm summer afternoon. It’s accidental, created only by the intersection of building and sunlight. It’s great to find it, and I’ve even crossed a street for it, but it’s not a true, deep, cultivated shade.
There’s a watering hole I pass on my way to the beach, a small restaurant and bar that has mastered the art of shade I remember from trips to hot, faraway places where air conditioning is nonexistent.
This is intentional shade: deep and palmetto-fringed. Ceiling fans are whirring and large rotating fans are blowing. The place is recessed but open. Every time I pass by I’m tempted to linger in its recesses, to seek relief in its dark, cool interior.
The discerning beach-walker is a connoisseur of sand. Too hard and it’s like walking on pavement. Too soft and it requires twice the effort to go the same distance.
So one becomes aware of a tension, a balance, between moisture and dryness, tide-in and tide-out. The feet search for this balance without prompting, seeking the best path along the strand.
Sometimes they find it and sometimes they don’t. But there’s a pleasure in the process.
Last night under the stars, a glimpse of the planets: At Wolf Trap Center for the Performing Arts, the National Symphony Orchestra performed Gustav Holst’s “The Planets,” accompanied by NASA photographs, with my favorite movement, “Jupiter: the Bringer of Jollity,” scoring the most applause.
Jollity is defined as “the quality of being cheerful.” Can a planet be cheerful? Perhaps if it’s named after the king of the gods. Or if it’s a gas giant more than twice as massive as all the other planets combined.
One reason not to be jolly: what looks in photos to be a big red eye. It’s not the result of excessive interplanetary partying, but a centuries-old storm bigger than Earth.
And speaking of Earth, the only planet Holst omitted from his piece, today at 7:15 a.m. EST is the one moment of the year when most of its people are bathed in sunlight — an incredible 99 percent of us. A reason for jollity, to be sure.
(Photo: Courtesy NASA)
The skin is an organ. But it’s an organ that blushes. No wonder, then, that we treat it differently than we do, say, our liver or spleen. Specifically — and especially at this time of year — we protect it from the sun. Or we don’t.
For many years, I actively sought a tan. I was a member of the baby-oil-and-baking-on-a-beach crowd. I sunbathed on my towel in various parks in Chicago and New York City. I’d spend entire days outdoors daubing on only a little SPF 8. I even laid out on the hot tar roof of my Greenwich Village apartment.
Tans made me look better, I thought. They evened out my skin tone, gave me a rosy glow. They also, through the years, damaged my skin.
I converted to sunscreen years ago, 45 SPF or higher. But this summer, I’m redoubling my efforts. I reapply often. Sometimes, I even carry sunscreen around in my purse. I’ve become, if not fanatical, at least responsible. And so, I enter the summer pasty and white — or make that pale and healthy.
