(Y-Fighter / Resistance)
The boy and I had another day together yesterday. I enjoy these moments just as they are.
We picked up a 250+ pound generator from Costco. I wrestled it into the back of the car, from the cart, by myself. I then had a man help me set it upright when we arrived at Limantour Beach because I started to worry that there was a ^ This Side Up ^ image on it, and there was. I had no room left in my heart for an error of any kind.
Once at the beach, the boy and I walked north towards the three or four grand white cliffs that are far away and stretch out to the edge of the land, where Point Reyes meets the visible Pacific. We mostly shuffled and darted along the surf line for perhaps three quarters of a mile, never stepping into the water much. The boy took his sandals off, but the water was cold and mostly uninviting, filled with green and brown algae arriving here in a somewhat unpleasant state. Though the sound of it was reliably nice.
After we saw the first larger jellyfish washed ashore the boy started counting them. We stopped at 13 for a bit and we pondered the unlucky number and their unlucky fate, having washed up here on shore. The boy counted - onwards and upwards - to 60, as we were finally leaving the beach. Most of them were very small. Children the boy guessed, though I suggested there were different species and one kind was simply, naturally smaller, you see. You could detect differences between the big ones and the small ones, I offered, though I believed the boy to be right. Without confirming, we speculated that they can regenerate their parts like starfish and this explained nearly everything. We were only seeing parts of the whole. This view of the world worked for us.
We marveled at the sculptured shoreline. We walked into the dunes where we could see even further up the shore and out across Drake's Bay. I prevented the boy from venturing off into the expanse of estuary along the backside of the dunes where the sand meets another completely different type of protected waterway - a rather nice beach swamp, with a river running through it, lots of inviting trails through the plants - that lead back towards where the San Andreas fault separates this piece of land from mainland America.
The estuary is not protected by any signs or fences, but it is part of a national park, so preservation is implicit, as is caution. It is a place that invites contemplation and many seem to come here to revere that lone sentiment. Though, I inwardly bristled at some graffiti - just tagging, in one color - that someone had done on the direction signs near the parking lot. I felt old becoming disappointed in it. But there was no escape. I found the expression of their identity tedious and selfish, because to this now-aging man that's all that it is.
The sky was overcast. The boy wore his Stormtrooper pullover sweater and I wore a second short-sleeved t-shirt. We were as underprepared this time, even though we remembered to wear our swimming shorts, as we were last time, and in nearly opposing kinds of shortsightedness. We were fine, but naive in our preparations again.
That didn't stop us from eating oysters and fish and chips. We sat out on the pier in the sun and the wind. We didn't take any pictures, there was so much to see. We talked about the tides, and we could see where they would be later that night.
After the beach, and after our oyster lunch at Nick's Cove, we went to an amusement center called Scandia. I had promised the boy that we would. We drove go-karts and rode on a ring that lifted us to and dropped us from the sky unexpectedly and in revolutions. We could see the hillsides for miles. We laughed and let go of the restraining harnesses as it fell, holding our hands out to show our courage.
We did the batting cages. The boy regarded it with the appropriate amount of enthusiasm and caution. He is a little bit young for a 40 mph softball, though he connected with a few of them. I went first, to show him that anybody can strike out as much as they want. It's easy. He connected with a few. I connected with one that filled him with admiration. An in-the cage home run. That was all that I needed to do to be revered in that moment. I am thankful the moment arrived and departed without depositing an injury into my spinal column.
We did not bring sunscreen. My head was rupturing with the effects of the decision. We opted for a stop at Target on the way home to get another Lego project, instead of leaving the go-karts and returning after getting some expensive mayonnaise in a tube that might promise to do battle with the sun on our behalf.
We agreed that it would take us two nights to complete the Y-Wing Resistance Fighter. We did it in one, and then a little bit more in the morning.
I brought home tuna steaks and seared them in oil, also with asparagus, and shrimp. I bought Raquel a bottle of white wine which I enjoyed watching her drink. Kopriva.
I have several pictures of us there before the boy was born, with Barkley, then again shortly thereafter. I found this one online. There are moments in which the place really looks just like this, in the evenings. It is so easy to see and not very far from here.
(Looking south)
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