#NewThisDay Writing From My Photo Stream

Menemsha Beach Stones

Look at the birds. Even flying
is born

out of nothing. The first sky
is inside you, Friend, open

at either end of day.

~ Li-Young Lee, excerpt from “One Heart”

Day: opening before 6:00 a.m. Coffee made and taken to go. Charlie in the car. We drive to Great Rock Bight in Chilmark. I get the parking lot right. No one else is out yet. We follow the wooded trail in the damp fresh morning down to the beach. Gulls. Cormorants. Calm. We hike up the beach to the Brickyard, follow the trail over and around through the scrub, then back to the very rocky part of the beach. And back to Great Rock Bight. A quick dip, seaweed thick, and not refreshing this morning. I itch from the seaweed as I drive home. All day we hang out together, a trip to the Chilmark Flea market and I buy my daughter a vintage dress. We pack, again, our Chappaquiddick picnic and grill our dinner after swimming and walking and reading. Everyone is reading all day. Home at sunset. We all shower, then sit on the deck. Still reading. I am finishing “The Covenant of Water,” and it’s very good; an epic of India in the 20th century. Already I am adding to my list, hungry for the next great read.