Big Waves

Coronado Beach Calm

On most days, Coronado Island is not the locus for big waves.  But sometimes, nature delivers big surf in the most unexpected places.  That’s the kind of day to take the camera out, screw on the biggest zoom lens I own and saunter off down the sand.  It’s a day to wade into the water and let it crash around my thighs.  It’s a day to dig my toes a little deeper against the strong pull of the undertow that wants me to come out to sea to play for a while in the roller coaster ride of the next big wave.  Click.  Click. Click.  Crash. Crash. Crash. 

I wonder if it would ever get old if I lived at the beach and could frolic on the sand whenever I pleased.  Ah, that would be the life – falling asleep and waking up to the ebb and flow of the surf crashing on the shore.   It would need to be a desolate beach – one that was hard to get to so I could have it all to myself all of the time. 

Coronado Spray

My house would be high on a cliff overlooking my secret beach.  Like Doris Duke’s Shangri La, it would have a wall of glass that receded into the floor – opening my living room to the sea and the sun.  The floors would be made of the lightest blond wood and the wall opposite the sea would be cerulean blue as if the sea and the sky had come indoors.  For those cold winter nights, there would be a fire pit filled with glass beads in the center of the room with low slung beach chairs made of teak and red striped canvas sitting at the ready around it.   White sofas and chairs would stand like soft sentinels just waiting for me to sink down into the deep cushions and forget where my tush ends and the cushion begins.

Coronado Crashing

The house would be shaped like an L and off the living room on the right hand side would be the door to a massive kitchen with countertops carved of the stone that the house sits upon.  The kitchen would be tricked out with a Viking stove and a beehive oven for those wood-fired pizzas and empanadas that I’d suddenly know how to make.  Sliding glass doors would lead to shallow steps down to an infinity edge pool tiled with blue and green tiles that sparkle in the sun. 

Down a weathered flight of steps (200 to be exact), there’d be a fire pit surrounded by big boulders smoothed and ready for a driftwood fire on a summer night. The kitchen would always be stocked with s’more makings and sharpened sticks would always be at the ready for when the mood strikes.  At least once a day, the sea would be calm enough for an ocean swim and the sand would always be a cool white powder that invites a barefoot walk from end to end.

Coronado Perfect

The basement of my house would be a tricked out great room with every electronic gadget known to woman.  My kindle would be loaded with all the books I could ever want to read, I’d have an iTunes library bar none, and the latest movies would beam directly into my home.  Blasted out of the rock, it would open to the sea with a sturdy wooden deck for watching the sun go down while relaxing in a weathered old Adirondack chair straight from the Catskills.   With a room this size, I wouldn’t have to choose between a deep comfy sectional and the writer’s chair of my dreams – there’d be room for both and then some!  The walls here would be filled with my flotsam and jetsam from years of traveling the world.  Fine art would mix with found art which would live next to outsider art.  Eclectic but working all the same.

Coronado Crashed

Upstairs would be two master suites (for the occasional guests invited to share my own Shangri La) – each complete with its own deck and hot tub.  There would be retractable skylights for those nights that I or my guests wanted to sleep under the stars and cozy fireplaces would take the chill out of the air.  Downy white quilts would grace the beds sheer white curtains would billow in the ocean breezes.  The tubs in the bathrooms would have views of the sea and the showers would be lined with tiles in all the blues of all the seas in the world.

Coronado Pounding

In my room there would be a spiral stair to the widow’s walk that graces the roof of the kitchen.  A strong pergola would provide welcome shade and yoga mats would stand ready for morning reflections.  And I would be able to stand on my head or twist my body into a pretzel with the distant sound of the waves crashing filling my ears as I sunk deep into the tranquility of being still and breathing deeply.

From the road, passersby would only be able to glimpse the top of the pergola as they drove by.  They wouldn’t know that the dirt road winding its way over the windblown cliff led to Shangri La above a secret beach. 

No, that life wouldn’t get old.  In my minds eye, I can picture it.  I’m catching the perfect wave and riding it to the end of the world.  

Coronado Wave on the Cusp of  a Break