Long distance, pt. VII

There’s no room to wander except down the narrow slope cornered by old three-story, late-nineteen century tenements in ruins so I make the call to go back before the sun sets for good.
The view from over here, overlooking the bay past the carpet of small houses sprawling seawards, is nothing short of amazing. It goes straight on past the big cargo ships anchored down and waiting for mooring, up until where the oil tankers meet with the horizon and they all merge against the crawling backdrop of night rising from beneath the waves.
One lonely cool, dry gust of autumn wind blows in- it lasts but a second, it really does, before the heat and the humidity settle in again- Here’s Atlantic Ocean yonder preparing to bid goodbye to the summer.

I stood back in wonder a couple of months ago when P**** casually mentioned he’d never really realized up until that moment the sun never set over our ocean as it did back on his shorelines down south and to the west.
Sunsets over the Pacific Ocean… I strongly believe that’s the real reason all true good dreams end up in California anyway: Because everybody gets to go west for the gold at least once in a lifetime.

I shake the dust off my sneakers and check the phone for the time. There’s no avoiding from smiling at the irony that there’s no daylight savings time in the land of eternal summer: The rest of the free-world rides an hour ahead, which probably means we have one hour to save the world if push comes to shove. Luckily it doesn’t.
The faux-coconut shavings are still clogging the straw but I pretend I don’t mind and gulp down all the milk-shake in my hand anyway.