Different day, different beach
Grandchildren being buried in the sand
Randy’s daughter Hayley and her family went to Santa Cruz on vacation and invited me to come down one day, play with kids at the hotel pool and on the beach, and then to have dinner together. So Erin and I drove down, ate lunch by the pool while the kids played mermaid, then went down to the beach (very hot sand) where we buried the boys in the sand. We were supposed to meet for dinner at 6, and then everyone but me decided to take a nap. Erin and I sat by the pool for a while longer but pre-dinner time seemed to be descending into happy hour with hula hoop contests and so on. So Erin went to nap in the car (I swear she can sleep anywhere) so it was just me hanging around the parking lot with time on my hands.
Santa Cruz beach and boardwalk was a big destination back in the day when Randy and I were in high school with its big roller coaster, cotton candy, caramel apples (my personal favorite), and a variety of carnival games I was no good at. Randy and I never went together of course - he went with the cool kids and I tagged along with whoever would let me tag along.
I am no longer interested in roller coasters so I walked down to the pier lined with restaurants, shops, and people fishing off the sides. I saw a few people fishing and some kids running around, and there were lots of couples holding hands and being romantic. And there I was, all by myself, again - just like my last beach trip in Half Moon Bay. I suddenly remembered a day during the early part of our relationship when Randy and I strolled down that pier just like these couples - we had lunch and browsed the various shops and Randy gave me a lecture about fishing and fish.
And I just started to cry. Two hours from home with no one to hand me a tissue or give me a hug. I walked back to the hotel, sniffing, and texted Hayley to bring my purse out to me so I could go home. She was concerned, of course, but I couldn’t talk. I went back to the parking lot for Erin and told her I wanted to go home. Still crying, unable to find the parking ticket to get through the gate. Eventually Erin drove us home through the redwoods and over the hill and into the South Bay traffic. Highway 17 runs from Santa Cruz up to the East Bay, but once you get over the hill it’s ugly, traffic is pretty heavy, and there are lots of big trucks. So we did what I always do - we veered west to take Highway 280 which has much less traffic, no big trucks, and unwinds through golden hills on one side and heavily wooded hills on the other, kept green by the marine layer of fog that descends most nights.
What I forgot is that when you start that far south you go through a bunch of (relatively) small cities - the cities of my youth and later my life with Randy. We passed Campbell where Randy was living in a studio apartment when I first came from Iowa to visit him - wanting to see if we really had something or whether I was imagining it. Then a few exits ahead we passed Sunnyvale where we both grew up and went to high school. Then Mountain View where we stayed in an apartment close to Stanford while Randy was recovering from the lung transplant. So much history, so many memories - it’s like being dragged through a worm hole. (That’s a science fiction thing, right? Time and space?)
I hear so much about how it’s so important to get out of the house, engage with the world, be with people. But when I do that I often have to go home and cry. Like I’m not already sad enough. I hate this.