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Nighttime
at the shore, and the waves continue to throw themselves against
the land. The occupants of the house had begun to settle down
for the evening, with a book or stitching for company. Outside
the house, the sky was particularly dark, as if it would pour
into the room if a window were accidentally opened. The air
and the lights had a different feel there at Cape Cod than they
had away from the sea. Perhaps it was the salt air from the
ocean, or how the night sky ran seamlessly into the black ocean
to form an unfathomable unknown. The peninsula sat out in the
Atlantic, not bravely, rather is just sat with no choice in
the matter at all; every day a bit more gave itself up to the
ocean and the waves.
The house settled down for the evening; I, however, decided
to drive to the lighthouse at the ocean. I wanted to see the
lights from the lighthouse being sent out to sea, hitting the
beach, spotlighting whatever crossed its way. My father decided
to keep me company; he thought I should not go alone. In the
car, he began to talk, something to pass the time. But I told
him I would rather just listen to the music playing. So the
car drove on the dark roads to the ocean, and we listened to
Belle and Sebastian playing songs on the radio.
The car drove on, through Chatham with the shops' windows unlit
until morning. At the lighthouse we stepped out of the car and
into the darkness. My father and I could only see each other
when the lighthouse spun its light around on us. Other than
those few seconds, everything was black. I walked down the staircase
to the beach itself; my father sat by the car--to sketch the
lighthouse, in the dark. On the sand, I could not see much of
anything at all. I could hear laughing somewhere to my left;
I walked to my right. To find the direction of the ocean was
easy--follow the sand's decline. But, the exact location of
the ocean was harder to learn. The lighthouse continued to throw
its light on the beach; in a blink though, everything would
be black again. The sound of the waves became louder, and the
decline more steep. The sand became a series of ridges; I continued
to walk on those, moving closer to the water, I could only assume.
As I was to put my foot down on another ridge, the lighthouse
light shined upon the beach. The next step would have landed
my foot resolutely in the water. I had found the ocean; I stood
and watched what I could see of it. The lighthouse continued
to send its light around. Out in the ocean the sound of ships
could be heard, but only tiny bobbing lights could be discerned.
So the waves continued upon the shore, the lighthouse shined
its light.
Farther back on the beach I sat to watch the sky. I do not know
my constellations, and I can not read my future in the path
of the stars. That, however, does not impede sitting and watching.
Cities like New York and London manage, night after night, to
outshine the stars. On that beach at Cape Cod, the stars had
only the black sea below. Somewhere to my left, I heard more
laughing; I followed the sound back to the stairs and the car.
My father was waiting, in the dark and the cold. In the car,
we didn't talk; we just listened. At the house, in a bright
room, my father opened his sketch book. His drawing of the lighthouse
was composed of thick black and white lines, like a woodblock
carving.
Matthew Patrick, September 1998
Drawing by M Patrick |
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