TBT- On Such A Winter's Day

I don't know why, but for some reason, I've got this hankering to see the ocean.

I've never been an ocean lover, a surfer, or a beach bum. It's too cold to swim in, and, well, sharks. I hate that feeling you get when seaweed brushes up against your calf, and I really hate it when people let their children run without a leash, and there is nothing worse than sand in your butt crack.

Well, maybe one thing worse, but I don't have one of those.

But I do love the sound.

And I do love the smell.

And I love facing out into the vast emptiness, with my feet in the wet sand and the waves rushing back out to sea.

I love holding hands with my girl and not saying much.

It's been a long time since I've been to the beach.

Okay, maybe like ten months, but for a Californian, that's like dog years.

This shot was taken many years ago on Pebble Beach. Joann and I had been looking forward to this vacation for a few months and we were just pleased as punch that we could spend a few days together down by the sea.

Although the vacation wasn't bad, it was, well, pretty much the lamest vacation we have ever taken.

First it was too cold and windy. The cottage, though pretty, was really damp. There seemed to be zero grocery stores in the area, and the beach was dog friendly.

Which, you know, is great, unless like me you have a particularly large area of personal space when it comes to unfamiliar dogs. An area of personal space that also for some reason seems to attract everything with sharp teeth and four legs in a three hundred meter radius.

But it wasn't the unleashed dogs that made the trip lame, it was the fact that we did something stupid.

We decided to play it by ear.

One of the firm truths to our relationship, at least the vacationing aspect of it, is that we are terrible when we play things by ear. We can never decide on where to go, what to do, where to eat, we can never seem to find anything as simple as a coffee shop or a movie theater.

We simply are not play it by ear people.

We know this about ourselves, and yet still we sometimes get too lazy to pre work an itinerary and think maybe this time it will be different.

We are always wrong.

Always.

We should never play it by ear.

Ever.

So next time we decide to spend some time down by the sea, we're gonna have to have a plan.

Down to which stand we're gonna get hot dogs from. And which beaches have leash laws. And a good seafood restaurant, and the closest Taco Bell. Where to have breakfast in the morning and what time Captain America is playing at the local theater.

And we shall have a good time.

And let the sea take care of the rest.

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