Beach or Bust

I love capturing Kodak moments of experiences. It's like having a photo-book of good times you can take with you everywhere so remembering special days or little vacations is a breeze. Just open it up and dig in. 

The front page of mine is bearing a van painted with the words "Surprise! ...beach or bust..." and a green car-pack on the top, packed with the camping gear Serena and I haphazardly threw together that morning in our haste to steal Verity from Bingo and the "old folks." Pan to your right and there's Verity, on the verge of happy tears, shouting, "You can't take me away from work!" Yes, actually we can. And did. 

The next pages are full of memories, collaged together with bright and happy faces. Red and white fills the next along with fat dripping from the corners in big globules of tasty badness as Dairy Queen burgers are served all round. Becki's got the jitters during rousing card games whilst the campfire refuses to live and thrive and find it's being, throwing itself to the winds--literally. Sides are splitting during chubby bunny and "mark"mellows; Serena listens in dread to the family returning to the campsite behind us determined to share ghost stories (that's hearsay, I put my ear plugs in long before). And of course, the bathroom is nintey-seven miles away so Serena and I refused to leave our sleeping bags out of sheer stubborn will in defiance of nature's call.

Day 2 brings us breakfast at Cowbelle's where "Flo"--or someone--called us "hun" and brought us (Becki and I) our coffee. The decor of that place was exceptionally black and white, cows being quintescential to the theme. Off North to Human Bean to satisfy Serena's nostalgia, then back South to Arcadia beach where the little boy wading in good white socks explained to us the dangers of barber snails (they'll kill you in 2 minutes flat. He knows; one killed his grandpa. But he was old anyway.) and the joys of sea anenomes and "sand sharks" which, interestingly enough, really aren't sharks and don't live in sand, but they are  poisonous. The gray sky passes overhead to reveal our friend, the wide expanse of blue, dotted with fresh white clouds swept along by that salty sea breeze that has revived many a fair heroine before us. Manzanita for a can opener and more grease in the form of Lays Ruffle chips and of course, soft drinks, don't ya know. Tuna sandwiches then the consensus that we wouldn't "hate" ice cream and could probably "choke some down" so to it we flew, greeted by Rockaway's multi-colored ice cream shop where the "ladies" couldn't decide what they wanted and Verity chastised me for not telling her to only get one scoop. Vintage shops where a not-so-vintage bowl tried to escape in Verity's bag--alas, for the practicality of older sisters. Operatic singing lessons hosted by Becki along the coast seem simple, but at 10 in the morning, the vocal chords are no stretchier than the rest of my body. A general outbreak of "Phantom of the Opera" music determines the fate of the weekend and our love/hate relationship with Gerard Butler, mask or no. Naps and reading and writing on the beach whilst Verity satisfies her nostalgia by swimming; talks of literature, stories, and authors make my heart come alive and inspire my pen, along with the sun sinking and casting a long bright light toward me, making shadows of all that come between us. Showers, because... ew. Pizza because it was desired, Yahtzee because I said so (I won).

Depot Bay on the last day brings no whales, only more blue sky and the deepest blue sea I've ever seen in Oregon (it reminded me of a heart-shot I took of Trinidad, CA). Echoes of laughter and fake, awful accents and the Phantom are still ringing in my ears, even after the trip has ended. 

That's why I keep a memory book (and a trip journal), of course.