Sawyer is a spontaneous singer, which is lovely. He makes songs up with sweet lyrics like “I love my mommy,” or “It’s really fun on a camping trip.” He also favors Jingle Bells and Frosty the Snowman and today, “Dreidle, dreidle, dreidle.” He favors them over and over and over. Which is pretty much okay given his sweet and soft voice.
This morning we packed up our trailer and gave the dump station our first go (way too successful for the amount we’ve used the toilet, we think we got a little extra for our money in the potty department). We headed north to Huntington Beach to meet up with Ned and Sammy and Jack. On the way we stopped at Target as Sawyer was out of pullups and we were trying for sand toys having made a promise on the first days of the trip. It was slightly odd to be in a shiny retail environment; I felt a bit like an alien on a foreign planet, dazed by the bright lights and colors and red and khaki clad creatures. Even in gorgeous Southern CA, sand toys are a “seasonal item.” We left with pull ups and new crayons. And an sense of indignity that two miles from the Pacific we were about to act unseasonally.
It was wonderful to spend time with just the East Coast Freers as it gets a bit overwhelming with so many extended relatives after a bit. Sammy and Jordan were peas in a pod – or fish in a school. They were drenched in minutes, and had not a single disagreement or episode of tears in their three hours of beach playing. Jack was under the weather, but still had some fun building sand castles with Sawyer who was his usual self, reveling in the joys of sand, rolling, falling, throwing, crawling – as long as he was a safe distance from the water. The beaches were plenty crowded with large numbers of people acting out of season, building sand castles, playing beach volleyball and sunbathing. Despite a lousy surf report, there were lovely though small waves rolling in, and despite Jordan having responded “24” earlier in the day to the question “How old are you going to be when you learn to surf?”, she was ready for her first launch into the waves.
Clothed in a t-shirt and skirt, she walked out into the surf with Tom and he got her own the board, pushed her into the wave, and she sailed a good 30 yards straight into shore, grinning the whole time. Sammy was game, too, amazingly, but she gave it just a single go, having upended halfway into shore – no tears, however. Jordan’s next three attempts were not as successful as her first, but she was smiling despite a good case of the shivers. After another fifteen minutes of sand play, we reluctantly headed for the cars, driven by hunger. As Ned leaves CA tomorrow, we of course were In N Out bound.
Tom did an impromptu concert in the In N Out parking lot before we jumped in and bravely headed North on the 405. It was smooth sailing until we got closer to the 10, and all the reasons why Southern CA isn’t such a dreamland came rapidly into focus. An hour in heavy traffic had us yearning for the wide open northern reaches and we were happy to peel off into Malibu and Highway 1 again, a gorgeous sunset as our farewell. At 25c, the vastly overpriced bathroom in the Malibu ARCO reminded us that paradise isn’t necessarily a product of where in CA you are, so we’re headed north still, it’s past bedtime and we hope to make it to Morro Bay before the kids implode so we can extend our vacation by another twenty four hours, and sail into Lotus with the sound of the ocean still in our ears. And plenty of sand in our cracks.
• A footnote on San Louis Obispo
I had heard about this but never seen it until we happened to notice it while walking around SLO on Christmas Eve: an alley between two buildings, the walls of which are entirely covered with pieces of chewed gum. Most of you will recognize that as my own personal version of hell. I recommend never, ever visiting it. Ever. I am shuddering as I write this.
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