I am in Love: With a Place

The surf is high today; the ocean roaring. Waves, long curls, are catching the sun and becoming transparent turquoise with sand, surfers, sea birds and seals showing in the light before they crash into the shore in long white spuming lines, like piano scales, all 88 keys, made of foam and light.

We have been camping at Carpinteria State Beach for one week, plus the day we spent here before LA. It was that first day here when I knew I had fallen in love with this place. It is not only the expansive and accessible beach, the tide pools that appear and disappear, the sunsets that are different and exquisite every day. It is more than the opportunity to watch the sunrise from my bed in the camper on the beach, or wake in the night and see the moon and stars through the sky light. There is something about this place. I have never before experienced this sense of being just where I am meant to be. I can only describe the feeling as love.

Rosco Digs the Beach

I guess it is fair to add, that beach vacations are a key part of our happiest family stories. Whether Goa, Florida or the Oregon Coast, our family loves the ocean and the sand. Also, our family history is steeped in the love of all things citrus, so I think I was predisposed to love being here - but still, what I feel is more than just happy vacation.



This beautiful beach park is incredibly well planned and maintained (even hot water sinks for washing dishes!), and our beach front spot is truly prime real estate. But even beyond my love of the beach and the sun and the water, I am crazy about the town. There is everything we need here.  A library where we go to charge our laptop, read our mail and check out the newspapers; an artisan bakery with bread worth driving a thousand miles for, a great big Albertson’s where they grill tri-tip steaks, steam your sea food, and sell vodka! A farm cart loaded with the most delicious organic mandarins, ruby lettuce and avocados.  There is a great second hand book store, and when I needed help with a knitting project, there is a shop for that as well. There are charming shops and lovely restaurants and fabulous places to walk.

On a rainy day (yes there have been some, (I celebrate them for the good of this thirsty state) we were close to Santa Barbara and an afternoon spent looking at expressionist and Asian art at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art.

If all of this were not enough, there is sunset Tai Chi and Chi Gong on the beach, as well as a groups of plein air painters out this morning. However, what has taken me completely by surprise is the neighborhood – a short walk across the railroad tracks is like finding Bizarro Rivergrove (my town). It is all the same, except with different plants in the garden. It is the oddest feeling, but the neighborhood, the age and design of the houses, the lot sizes and layout, the cars in the driveways, the power poles on the corners, the feel of the streets, even the colors look exactly like my neighborhood – and I feel right at home.

Because the weather is so glorious, we spend lots of time walking – the beach of course at sunset, and all afternoon for sunning and playing in the water, but in between, I can’t resist wandering around the streets, imagining my house here, with an orange laden tree, and a lemon tree and a sprawling avocado, and several enormous aloe and cacti plants in place of my apple and pear trees. I am enchanted, and by the way, so is H. We know we will move on, and perhaps find another magical connection, but not just yet. The weekend promises perfect weather, and as everyone I meet says, it doesn’t get better than this.