Monday, June 14:
Catching Up on a Rainy Monday: I woke up at about 5:30 this morning and figured this was the best opportunity I would get: It was as early as I was likely to get up on a beach morning, and we'd had a mighty impressive storm the night before, and if shells were going to wash in and I was going to find them, this would be as good as it would get.
I've always romanticized while walking down the beach, eyes scanning the passing sand like the hair-netted woman working the Lay's production line culling out the chips that are a little too black or have a little too much peel on them, thinking I'd find better shells if I was the first one on the beach, right after a big storm churned up the sea and threw great baskets-full of beautiful shells onto the shore. Sure, if I was the first eyes on the beach, at dawn, after a storm, the beach would be littered with conch shells as big as my head. The sky would be light with Homer's rosy-fingered dawn, the clouds of the night before distant on the horizon, the cumulonimbus anvil-tops sparkling pink and orange, the clear green see-through waves crashing big and strong into an explosion of foamy white. I'd see silver flashes of mullet cutting through the tips of the waves before they broke. And I'd walk, and collect my weight in beautiful shells, the difficult task being deciding which ones to throw back. If only I could be the first one on the beach after a storm.
The Drummonds are having another family get-together at the beach this summer. We had one four years ago, the week of July 4, 2000, in Orange Beach, Alabama (I think that's when we announced to the family that Anne Marie was pregnant with Mary). My brother Shawn, his wife Paula, Jimmy, Katie and Zane live in Fairhope, Alabama, where Paula is a pediatrician. Since the whole family usually gets together in Houston at the holidays, we tend not to think of the Texas coast when planning these things. Plus the beach is much better here. And Shawn and Paula have a second small house on Perdido Bay, so we'll have some extra room. And we can make Paula and Shawn shop for beach houses.
In 2000, Paula and I did some internet searching and catalogue shopping to find 2 houses in Romar Beach, a small one right on the beach to serve as our base of forward operations and a bigger one back across the street to serve as the dormitory. We originally focused on the more populous Gulf Shores, but the location of their bay house and a little local knowledge of summer traffic here led us further east towards Orange Beach. It worked out quite well, and all six Drummond kids and their families made it. This year, Paula did all the legwork herself and found us the Booked Up, a 5-bedroom, 3-bath base of operations right on the beach, a stone's throw from the Florida state line (and the famous Flora-Bama Bar - think Gilley's on the beach). We drove from Dallas to Hattiesburg, Mississippi Friday, and finished the trip Saturday, rendezvousing at the bay house before heading to the Booked Up ("BU"). Gina caught the third fish of her life (I'll get to the other 2 when I catch up), a foot-long catfish, off the pier of the bay house. I actually caught a catfish myself, but I was just trying to get the bait off of the hook. Gina named her fish William, and Katie named the one I caught Alberta (they like to name the animals they see; Gina just told me about Francisco, a big bird she saw on the bay house dock, and Quimby, the clam I dug up at the beach Saturday afternoon). Although Gina wanted to eat her catfish, we practiced catch-and-release. The fish wouldn't have delivered much of a meal, and besides, I don't know how to clean them.
By Saturday night, we were esconsed in BU: Art and Rhonda, who also drove Friday but went all the way to the bay house where they spent the night with Randall and his girlfriend Chrissy, who drove in from Jacksonville where Randall is in the Navy; the Dallas Drummonds, and the Alabama Drummonds. Colleen, Charlton, Sydney and Logan drove from Houston on Saturday, and made it to BU Saturday night (they're staying at the bay house again). Leanne will arrive Wednesday, and Greg, Toni, Kevin and Travis won't be able to make it this year.
Last night brought a heck of a storm. After a long Sunday on the beach, a tropical depression out in the Gulf decided to throw us a rain band. We ran down to the beach to collect the umbrellas and beach canopy Shawn had constructed, along with the beach chairs, shovels, pails, etc. before they blew away. The wind was probably around 50 mph, sand-blasting us until the rains came, when it became a combination of blasting rain and water. We corralled everything and wrestled the canopy to the ground and semi-disassembled it and stored it out of the wind under the house. Art, Shawn, Charlton, Paula and I were soaked to the skin by the time we got it all in. It was like an amusement park ride, but with lightning.
So when I woke up at 5:30 this morning, I figured this was my opportunity to live my dream and collect shells. Of course, reality doesn't hold a candle to imagination. The skies are still mean and gray, not rosy-fingered; the water's roiling, but gray instead of green. And instead of shells, most of the flotsam is junk washed ashore from boats or some other shore: mop heads, watermelon skins, plastic jugs. The beach is littered with lawn chairs, tarps, and beach toys; we're not alone in keeping our stuff out on the beach, but quite a few folks didn't brave the wet sandblasting to recover their stuff. There is a decent tidal pool on the beach now, but the water in it is pretty brackish; that white sea foam turns brown and smelly without new water circulating through it. I didn't walk too far down the beach when it started raining. Yeah, this was nothing like I thought it would be. I should've stayed in bed and left early-morning beach-combing to my imagination.
We'll be here at the beach through the week. The forecast was for typical Gulf Coast summer weather: highs in the high 80's - low 90's, chance for thunderstorms every afternoon. But this tropical depression in the Gulf has changed that. We may end up seeing some movies rather than baking on the beach. I'll keep you posted.
Top photo: the Booked Up. We had the left half of the place; it's actually a duplex of 5-bedroom houses.
Bottom photo: the view from the deck. That's Leanne and Shawn.
Catching Up on a Rainy Monday: I woke up at about 5:30 this morning and figured this was the best opportunity I would get: It was as early as I was likely to get up on a beach morning, and we'd had a mighty impressive storm the night before, and if shells were going to wash in and I was going to find them, this would be as good as it would get.
I've always romanticized while walking down the beach, eyes scanning the passing sand like the hair-netted woman working the Lay's production line culling out the chips that are a little too black or have a little too much peel on them, thinking I'd find better shells if I was the first one on the beach, right after a big storm churned up the sea and threw great baskets-full of beautiful shells onto the shore. Sure, if I was the first eyes on the beach, at dawn, after a storm, the beach would be littered with conch shells as big as my head. The sky would be light with Homer's rosy-fingered dawn, the clouds of the night before distant on the horizon, the cumulonimbus anvil-tops sparkling pink and orange, the clear green see-through waves crashing big and strong into an explosion of foamy white. I'd see silver flashes of mullet cutting through the tips of the waves before they broke. And I'd walk, and collect my weight in beautiful shells, the difficult task being deciding which ones to throw back. If only I could be the first one on the beach after a storm.
The Drummonds are having another family get-together at the beach this summer. We had one four years ago, the week of July 4, 2000, in Orange Beach, Alabama (I think that's when we announced to the family that Anne Marie was pregnant with Mary). My brother Shawn, his wife Paula, Jimmy, Katie and Zane live in Fairhope, Alabama, where Paula is a pediatrician. Since the whole family usually gets together in Houston at the holidays, we tend not to think of the Texas coast when planning these things. Plus the beach is much better here. And Shawn and Paula have a second small house on Perdido Bay, so we'll have some extra room. And we can make Paula and Shawn shop for beach houses.
In 2000, Paula and I did some internet searching and catalogue shopping to find 2 houses in Romar Beach, a small one right on the beach to serve as our base of forward operations and a bigger one back across the street to serve as the dormitory. We originally focused on the more populous Gulf Shores, but the location of their bay house and a little local knowledge of summer traffic here led us further east towards Orange Beach. It worked out quite well, and all six Drummond kids and their families made it. This year, Paula did all the legwork herself and found us the Booked Up, a 5-bedroom, 3-bath base of operations right on the beach, a stone's throw from the Florida state line (and the famous Flora-Bama Bar - think Gilley's on the beach). We drove from Dallas to Hattiesburg, Mississippi Friday, and finished the trip Saturday, rendezvousing at the bay house before heading to the Booked Up ("BU"). Gina caught the third fish of her life (I'll get to the other 2 when I catch up), a foot-long catfish, off the pier of the bay house. I actually caught a catfish myself, but I was just trying to get the bait off of the hook. Gina named her fish William, and Katie named the one I caught Alberta (they like to name the animals they see; Gina just told me about Francisco, a big bird she saw on the bay house dock, and Quimby, the clam I dug up at the beach Saturday afternoon). Although Gina wanted to eat her catfish, we practiced catch-and-release. The fish wouldn't have delivered much of a meal, and besides, I don't know how to clean them.
By Saturday night, we were esconsed in BU: Art and Rhonda, who also drove Friday but went all the way to the bay house where they spent the night with Randall and his girlfriend Chrissy, who drove in from Jacksonville where Randall is in the Navy; the Dallas Drummonds, and the Alabama Drummonds. Colleen, Charlton, Sydney and Logan drove from Houston on Saturday, and made it to BU Saturday night (they're staying at the bay house again). Leanne will arrive Wednesday, and Greg, Toni, Kevin and Travis won't be able to make it this year.
Last night brought a heck of a storm. After a long Sunday on the beach, a tropical depression out in the Gulf decided to throw us a rain band. We ran down to the beach to collect the umbrellas and beach canopy Shawn had constructed, along with the beach chairs, shovels, pails, etc. before they blew away. The wind was probably around 50 mph, sand-blasting us until the rains came, when it became a combination of blasting rain and water. We corralled everything and wrestled the canopy to the ground and semi-disassembled it and stored it out of the wind under the house. Art, Shawn, Charlton, Paula and I were soaked to the skin by the time we got it all in. It was like an amusement park ride, but with lightning.
So when I woke up at 5:30 this morning, I figured this was my opportunity to live my dream and collect shells. Of course, reality doesn't hold a candle to imagination. The skies are still mean and gray, not rosy-fingered; the water's roiling, but gray instead of green. And instead of shells, most of the flotsam is junk washed ashore from boats or some other shore: mop heads, watermelon skins, plastic jugs. The beach is littered with lawn chairs, tarps, and beach toys; we're not alone in keeping our stuff out on the beach, but quite a few folks didn't brave the wet sandblasting to recover their stuff. There is a decent tidal pool on the beach now, but the water in it is pretty brackish; that white sea foam turns brown and smelly without new water circulating through it. I didn't walk too far down the beach when it started raining. Yeah, this was nothing like I thought it would be. I should've stayed in bed and left early-morning beach-combing to my imagination.
We'll be here at the beach through the week. The forecast was for typical Gulf Coast summer weather: highs in the high 80's - low 90's, chance for thunderstorms every afternoon. But this tropical depression in the Gulf has changed that. We may end up seeing some movies rather than baking on the beach. I'll keep you posted.
Top photo: the Booked Up. We had the left half of the place; it's actually a duplex of 5-bedroom houses.
Bottom photo: the view from the deck. That's Leanne and Shawn.
posted by Jeff at
10:04 PM
