Sunset at Half Moon Bay

It's always so beautiful there at sunset. 

I've been there many times before, enjoying equally beautiful sunsets with the one I love. Long expanses of beach that seem to spread out in all directions, surrounding you in the midst of the panorama, with that gorgeous sunset, slowly turning more golden as it disappears gradually behind the coastal fog. The wind dances and laps at the white peaks of waves. Gulls screech, hover, soar. So far away yet so clearly you see what is arguably the world's happiest dog running, jumping, dancing at the edge of the waves... unleashed if not entirely free, tasting the space between a master and its dog, skirting that bit of proximity that lies between blind obedience and the chaos of independence. It it feels good to run free, it also feels comforting to be owned, to be cared for, to have a place where you belong. That fine line between extremes that somehow instinctively tastes like joy and freedom. 

 Wetsuit-clad surfers slowly paddle to the coast and trudge hip deep, knee deep, ankle deep in the wet sand, board in hand, from the wet, smooth greyness to the dry, uneven whiteness, moving as if in procession, in honor, and in mourning... a wake to yet another glorious day. A return to something approaching responsibilities, real world necessities, and the end of another long weekend that was never quite long enough.

The completion of a perfect day. The sun goes down. The light slowly ebbs. The wind picks up, and the misty cold starts to set in. And though you want to wring out the last moments, it's clearly time to go.

And as darkness comes, words written in the sand are lapped, kissed, embraced, and reclaimed by the great western ocean. 

Doonewey 

   Sourisone
     8-21-05
Half Moon Bay

The moment vanishes, leaving only  the faint, vanishing trace of words in the sand. 

We move forward uncontrollably, with hardly a ripple or a wave to mark our voyage. And yet, it is in that nothingness, that emptiness, in that lack of something essential, that lost, vanished, gloriously missing day, that we find meaning.