the backyard 35 minutes away

looks like this...



Because of the installation of the new printing press, the normal reporting schedule has been thrown off. So this morning, I dragged myself out of bed after a late night involving a 6 1/2 hour long progressive Italian dinner (amazing), and trotted down to the newsroom to plug my stories for Monday into the system. Then I went to church and in the middle of "Shine Jesus Shine! (lalalalala)" (the woman behind me amen-ing in an emotional vibrato like she was about to throw up a rib bone) I decided I would head down the coast and climb the cliffs. There was some sun out and I convinced myself that the ominous dark clouds hanging out at the fringe of the world were blowing inland and wouldn't make an appearance at the beach.



It was perfect. No wind. Warmish water. SUN. Empty beach except for a few old couples and their dogs and some girl with long hair who was sitting in a sort of despairing Celtic slouch on a low rockside with her iPod, gazing out to sea. I hate how people get about the ocean sometimes. They start calling it the "sea" and posing.



I climbed up and around the familiar area I've been climbing for the last...12 or so?...years. Then I went in search of a deer trail Liz and I once found and followed up over the cliffs and onto difficult-to-access beaches. It was pretty easy to find again and I hiked it for a bit until the mud killed me.

So, I do all of this barefoot which is a good thing, I think, since I don't technically know what I'm doing. Being barefoot gives me a better grip on and understanding of what I'm moving over. The problem with barefoot and February is that there's mud and you can't get a grip and gravity takes over in an undesirable, scientifically-correct way. It was especially bad on the deer trail so I was prudent and gave up after a while. On the way back down, I discovered a rope someone had fixed to a very high-up branch. You could swing on it out over a minor crevasse. So that was fun.



After my hike, I wandered around in the water, soaking my pants completely as per usual. The water was clear and clean and the foam was white. It felt like a new ocean and it was warmer than summer water (there's a scientific explanation behind that apparently, I just don't know it).



As I meandered back towards where I had come onto the beach, I tried to run into dogs. I just really wanted a gleeful, sloppy, ka-crazy dog to come running up to me so I could pet it. Some fluffy black monstrosity went bounding into the surf next to me, but ignored my entire existence. Stupid dog.

But then!

But then...as I measured my mournful steps through the pounding waves, noting the play of light beneath the water surface, spirals and ripples and the occasional spaceship-like collection of bubbles, out of absolute nowhere this mad, ocean-wet golden retriever raced up to me all a-bound and a-springy. It was SO HAPPY to see me. I got one pat in on its head before it just COULDN'T TAKE the excitement anymore and went racing back up the beach toward its owner. Oh smile my face.

But it gets better.

The dog and its owner passed me. She'd put him on a leash because he kept trying to chase a remote control airplane an old guy was flying. I was walking up over the dry sand now, towards the sea grass and the beach entrance when I hear this scrabbling sound behind me and suddenly the dog is right there. He must have run well over 200 yards straight to me. He whined a little PLEASE PET ME OH GOSH!!!!!!! So I did and then I said, "Hey, go back" and pointed back toward his owner who was just a speck against the ocean and the rocks and off that dog went, full speed.

Then I sat against a log with my backpack beside me and myself all dirty and ocean-soaked, hands and feet scraped and cut up from climbing, face in the sun, looking all scruffy and adventurous.

It's kind of been the best day ever.