The Good Old Summertime

Well Summer is officially here, and if it was just two days ago I would say you could feel it, for it was hitting those sweltering triple digits. We are currently having a cool down, in the 70's the sky is shades of gray and black as rain clouds drift  overhead and the breeze has just a touch of humidity to it; June Gloom at it's finest! With the June Gloom however it brings back memories of growing up on what is known as the Central Coast of California near the town of Pismo Beach. I spent many a wonderful time both with friends and family and by myself... countless hours of walking, playing, watching and collecting shells. June Gloom on the Central Coast did not mean skipping the beach, it just meant wearing a few extra layers. 

Pismo Beach today... just made to look old. *wink*

I can remember bomb fires, digging for sand crabs and so many sand dollars washing up, I felt rich with treasures from the sea! There was often car shows with cars from the early 1900's all the way up to modern day and everything in between. Musical festivals, surfers galore and for a time in my youth a roller skating rink that I frequented in the evenings after a long day of soaking in the sun. There was the best clam chowder ever and fish and chips. Of course candy apples and salt water taffy in every flavor you could imagine. One could sit for hours and watch the fishermen collect their supper right out of the ocean and if one was lucky, you could spot seals, dolphins and for the fun of it feed all the gulls as they swarmed overhead waiting for a handout. On occasion there was a carnival that would come through from time to time and you could take a break from sand in your toes and snack on cotton candy and twirl around in spinning cars. What a great way to spend the day for all ages!

As I aged there was quiet nights under the pier with the latest gent that I was dating, hidden from all and only the sound of the waves and a distant sound of music from the roller rink or giggling teens walking the beach by the moonlight. So very often there was parties where everyone you knew, and some people who you did not, gathered to drink and make merry and snack on the perfectly roasted marshmallow, the sticky never quite coming off your fingers or your face. As a young married woman, I brought my kids down to spend the day till they fell asleep in exhaustion, but with a happy smile on their faces. As they aged and I needed to finally loose the baby weight and have a break from motherhood, I would head down for an early morning stroll and then to sip my coffee on the pier lined with retirees and fishermen of all ages baiting the hooks and casting their lines from the end... the smell of salt water and fish filling the air. 

Life was not always a day at the beach to say the very least, but it was the one constant I could count on if I needed to relax, rejuvenate and collect my thoughts. I was never happier than when I could feel the sand beneath my toes and the sound of crashing waves mixed with the cry of the gulls. To feel either the sun or the mist that came with the June Gloom upon my face always made me smile. So as I sit here five hours to the north of my old stomping grounds, I do so with a slight smile once again remembering the good old Summertime of days gone by.