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The enduring mysteries of The Beach

quote of the day: “I spoke with strong feeling, and I’ll tell you why. A few months before, while celebrating Boat Race night, I had fallen into the clutches of the Law for trying to separate a policeman from his helmet” (from The Code of the Woosters.)

It’s always amusing when scenes from fiction that are meant to be comically absurd seem entirely within the bounds of one’s lived experience. P G Wodehouse offers up plenty of examples, but so do films like The Hangover. Anyway, on to business..

There are several enduring mysteries of The Beach:

  1. In the years between 1952 and 2010, was anyone conceived in the old cabin. If so, how? It seemed always to have at least 10 and often upwards of 15 people crammed into its two bedrooms + sitting room. Bravo.
  2. On the walk to Sundin (which one might call the traditional morning constitutional of The Beach) there is a set of pilings driven into the beach in a rectangular formation. Though much battered, they appear to have been intended as a sea wall or (more likely) a foundation. What was their purpose? When were they built? Were they ever used? I’ll put a picture up at some point. Opinions welcome.
  3. Do winter storms bring sand or take sand away? The amount of sand vs rocks on the beach varies significantly (including both extremes) from year to year.
  4. How, in the 15 months that we’ve owned the new house, have I managed to spend 22 days here, when I live 4,763 4,747 (correction thanks to Latitude history dashboard) miles away? Win!
  5. Why do pancakes and bacon (see photo below) taste so much better here than anywhere else. Is it the altitude? The humidity? The wind? Beach magic?

In any case, I’m happy to say that I have a tentative answer to Mystery #3, at least. As I mentioned before, we had a giant storm here earlier this week. Today on my walk to Sundin I noticed that there was substantially more sand (and very small rocks) than when I arrived last Friday. And it was heaped over the rocks in such a way that it was clear it had been deposited rather than uncovered. I’ll take my phone tomorrow to snap a picture. So my current theory is that sand is deposited by storms and then slowly washed away by the tide, and that the more storms we have in a winter, the more sand there will be the following summer. Sand, by the way, makes the walk to Sundin a lot easier and less likely to turn one’s ankle.

OK. The sun is out (which it’s not supposed to be tomorrow), so I’m going to go enjoy one last day of summer/September before digging in for a long, dark, rainy winter.

2011 09 30 aho updates Comments (0) Permalink

…on optimism

I am often accused of being an optimist. Now, I will readily admit that I’m a relatively happy person, and (mostly) pleasant to be around. I may even be guilty of having a rosy disposition. But optimist I am not. I will explain.

I have the best family and friends in the world, for whom I am extremely grateful. As a result, I spend inordinate amounts of time worrying  about them–a habit I blame on my latent maternal instinct. One of the problems with being an historian by both nature and training is that I am constantly aware that each of the people I love is bound to die. Bracing my self for that eventuality not infrequently keeps me up worrying long past my bed time.

Et in arcadia ego. Or perhaps I mean, “Never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee”. The thing is, I’m not particularly afraid of death itself. But I do hate the thought of people (especially people I love) suffering, either physically or emotionally. It is that fear which has a strong effect on me.

My worrying does have one positive side-effect. Since I know that I’m powerless to prevent or ease physical suffering (what am I, some sort of wizard?), I try to channel the energy I expend on worrying about bad things happening into showing my family and friends how much I love and appreciate them. It may be all I can do, but it seems a jolly good thing to do all the same.

Albert Einstein is credited with saying that “Once you can accept the universe as being something expanding into an infinite nothing which is something, wearing stripes with plaid is easy.” So too, learning to misapply my deep seated fears about death’s accouterments, I fin that it’s relatively easy to use similar sleight of hand to dispel pessimism’s other attempts to seep into my life.

This is, in part, what I mean when I say “we make our own reality”, a personal motto which I suspect drives Andrew a little bit nuts. How does it work? I’ll tell you. Whenever I’m presented with a set of imperfect options, it can be tempting to focus on the failings of each potential choice. As an example, let’s say that it’s approaching 6pm and I’m still busy at work. I find it very easy to think “I can’t win: either I’ll have to lose my evening OR  I’ll have to do a bad job on project x“. Well, instead I turn that on its head and think to myself “I can’t lose: either I’ll do a great job on this project, or I’ll have a lovely evening.”

It takes practice to be able to do this effectively. But once you’re looking at the benefits of various options (rather than their drawbacks), I find it easier to rank the set of options based on my values and priorities. which I suspect is a good thing.

2011 09 29 aho observations Comments (0) Permalink

Rations running low…

It is an unbelievably beautiful day here at the beach. 70 degrees and not a cloud in the sky:

…especially when compared to two days ago, when I worried more than a little bit that we were all about to be blown or washed off our foundations:

The tide is coming in, sparkling in the sun. I’m reading a fascinating book about the topographical and architectural impact of the Reformation in Britain and Ireland. There are herons and hummingbirds and bees and dragonflies. And it feels more like July than the end of September. I do wish Andrew and some of my family were here to enjoy it with me, but such is life.

The only problem, really, is that my rations are running quite dangerously low. Basically all that’s left in the fridge now is cheese and low fat vanilla yogurt (wtf?). And while both of those can be components of meals, neither will suffice in itself. I also have libations aplenty: wine, scotch, bourbon, gin, vodka and Pimms (the last of which I’m currently enjoying at the picnic table in front of the cabin).

I have a rental car (which, incidentally, I haven’t driven since Saturday), but it’s so beautiful out right now that I really don’t want to drive into town. So I will avoid it until the sun dips behind one of the islands bluffs (or until I get desperately hungry).

Going back to work on Monday is going to be very difficult. But at least I won’t be jet lagged.

 

2011 09 28 aho updates Comments (0) Permalink

The only rules that matter

Overheard: “it’s so much better doing things neatly and properly, even stupid things.” -the (fictional) dowager duchess of denver

So in my first post back, I warned that some of my posts would be rules for a satisfying life. I have more opinions on how to live a happy and satisfying life than any thirty-year-old should. In theory, I should be well past the hormone-fueled, passionate certainty that drives adolescents and university students. I should also (God willing) be a few decades from becoming “Old Man House”, shouting at the neighbourhood children from the rocking chair on my front porch.

That’s why these rules come with a few caveats. The first is that they’re descriptive rather than prescriptive. I’m Catholic (and mediæval) enough to to think that (a) the best rules are descriptions of the world as we would like it to be, (b) sometimes it is better to bend or even break rules than to follow them precisely, and (c) we’re all best served by being liberal with forgiveness. I’ll expand on some of those thoughts later, perhaps. I also reserve the right to revise the rules as I learn. I could call this evidence-based policy-making. But I won’t, because I’m far too sceptical of PR-driven governmental buzzword-creation (ahem).

Anyway, there are two fundamental rules, which I co-opted shamelessly from Allison D.:

  1. Don’t be an idiot
    and
  2. Don’t be a jerk.
If you keep those two rules in mind, you won’t go far wrong. All the other rules I’ll propose are really just my thoughts on how to apply the two fundamental rules to specific circumstances. I suspect that we could call idiocy a specific form of jerkiness, and be left with one rule…but I’m not desperate enough for a TOE to distill my moral code even further. At least not right now.
2011 09 27 aho 1. Don't be an idiot
2. Don't be a jerk
rules for life Comments (0) Permalink

Halfway through 2 weeks off

Today is Andrew & my first mensiversary. Noteworthy statistics about our first 31 days of marriage: We’ve spent 8 days together, secured 3 new UK residence permits, flown 24,400 miles & slept in 6 cities. Win.

My sister Amanda, meanwhile, got married 9 days ago, so Andrew and I headed to Spokane for the wedding. We’ve got a work thing in California that begins next Monday, too. So while Andrew headed back to London to work for two weeks (and then to go to Terrence’s wedding in western Massachusetts this upcoming Saturday), I opted to take two weeks off. I may be wrong, but I think this is the only time since starting work 5 years ago that I’ve had a solid fortnight’s holiday. And I think I like it.

I’m not doing anything fancy. I spent the first week in Spokane hanging out with my parents and our dog, reading, killing late summer bees, and buying too much stuff on Amazon (what else is new?). On Friday I was going to take a train from Spokane to Seattle (it leaves at 2am and takes over 8 hours!), but the cold I’ve had for the past couple weeks told me it didn’t want me staying up all night on a train. So I flew.

I rented a car in Seattle, picked up Amanda, and came up to the new beach, stopping for a burrito (obvs) on our way up. Troy joined us later that evening. The weather on Friday and Saturday was glorious, so we went to the Camano Island open farm day, and saw alpacas and lots and lots of squash. Then Amanda made delicious brazilian cheese balls, which were fantastic. Sunday, our cousins Louis, Stephen and Jen came up for dinner, along with Stephen & Jen’s adorable daughter Lucy and their GIANT dog Hugo. Hugo is honestly 25 times the size of Guster. We had meatloaf (two kinds!) and salad and rice crispy treats.

Alas, Troymetheus and Amanda had to return to Seattle for work this week. And the weather has turned. So I’m sitting in the cabin looking out at wind and rain and thinking I should read a million books. I’ve finished two of the three I brought with me, though. Thankfully the chances of my survival are bolstered by (a) tons of leftovers in the fridge and (b) my aunts’ obsession with mystery novels, which means there are a coupe hundred books to choose from in the cabin.

 

2011 09 26 aho updates Comments (0) Permalink

In which I attempt to revive the blog

Newsflash: I’m married now. In not-totally-unrelated news, I have resolved to resume blogging. So here we are. Those of you who have known me for a while may remember that I had a blog before there were blogs. I started it in August 2000. It has been more or less dormant since I came down from Oxford, and–due to an unfortunate incident in which I corrupted a MySQL database last year–I’ve lost the dozen or so posts since January 2008.

I have long blamed my failure to blog on lack of time. Not lack of time to write individual posts. That, really, is easy to find. But since having started to work in 2006, I haven’t had  (or perhaps I should say I haven’t taken)  enough time in daily life to reflect on my experiences. My failure of reflection has more practical consequences, as well. I’ve found that I forget more things since I began to work, and not just little things. I have more trouble remembering the things and experiences that I value the most.

And so here I am, making a conscious effort to be more present and more intentional. I hope that the revival of my blog will be a byproduct of that effort.

For the time being, I intend to focus on 3 different types of posts: updates (similar to the bulk of my old blog), observations (on everything from Ignatian spirituality to urban planning) and rules for a satisfying life (though I should say that my rules tend to be descriptive rather than prescriptive). In all cases I should warn you against expecting wit or wisdom. In reality, the posts will be like listening to me drone on about something or other…only in written form.

2011 09 25 aho observations
rules for life
updates Comments (0) Permalink