Vacation Post: Tuesday Morning

(Originally written 7/14/8)

Tuesday morning/Never looked so good
I’m already in/In a daydream

It’s Tuesday morning. Monday we took and adult walk to chill us the fuck out. Tuesday morning we were going to split up. T had her own agenda, which is perfectly cool. Tuesday was my first day to do something I haven’t really done in almost a year; go for a run. Longtime readers-all 5 of you-might remember a post last year about me running in OCMD with my beloved SummerSongs remix on and how it affected me. Short version: running up to the boards, then walking back listening to these songs was a pretty powerful experience to me. Now, here is my second chance. Before we went down, I loaded some new surf albums (I highly recommend Aqualads) so I could have some new stuff. The boardwalk was like 20 blocks north, so I decided to run south. I also decided to run on the streets. Don’t ask why, I guess I hadn’t totally grasped the idea of actually running on the beach. Or to the boardwalk.

I slathered on the lotion, put the shades, hat and cue the SummerSongs on my iPod. Since it is a beautiful Tuesday morning, it gets me to search for this great song. It’s called “In a Daydream” by the Freddy Jones Band. I know you have never heard of it. It was on my player a few weeks back, and just for the sake of this post, I will put it back on. It’s a great song for such beautiful early mornings. It’s a great summer song, and it’s a great roadtrip song. And today is the perfect chance to put some summer imagery to it. I cue it up and head out.

I don’t like to run. I really can’t run to save my life. Outside of street hockey on Monday nights and the occasional bout of cardio in the gym, I don’t really do much. I like to ‘interval’; run a block walk a block. It’s actually better for your metabolism, and keeps me much more mentally into the activity. I walk 2 blocks, have In A Daydream in my ears. I am full of life and full of myself. My first interval will be two blocks. I feel that damn good.

Unfortunately, I also feel that outta shape. I am huffing and puffing like Artie Lange. I knew I was bad, but not this bad. OK, minor setback. Back to one block intervals. OK, not so bad, and it does feel good to be doing something physical. Not like I am drinking that much, but that tubfull of cheeseballs sure is disappearing quick.

On my way, I pass some people. And they are not as friendly as you would think. I have noticed with most ‘shorefolk’, they tend to be happy. Doesn’t matter if they are the locals or vacationers. People just seem to act better near the ocean. Or maybe it’s because I look like I am running while suffering some kind of seizure. Or maybe because on the blocks I walk, I am breathing heavy. It looks like I am just on a stroll and breathing heavy. (Part of me really wonders if I am breathing in nasty shit from the j*b.)

I keep intervalling. I notice a lot of these houses look relatively new. A lot of them are truly sweet; multi-million dollar homes. Not just multi-million dollar homes based on location, but also the value of the damn house itself. 2-3 decks. Monstrous rooms. Intricate window work. All kinds of hardscaping going on. It all looks really nice; I mean don’t get me wrong. These houses are fucking sweet. I would love to have one of these houses just for my real house, let alone vacation property. But something about all this bothers me. None of these houses look really –“beachy”. Again, I would take one of these houses in a heartbeat, but if you look at most of them, they just don’t really cry “beach”.

It’s all a little bit haughty-taughty for me. It almost looks like I am running in a gated community. Every once in a while, I expect a tap on the shoulder from some rent a cop asking me , “Uh, excuse me, but just how the hell did you get in here?” Every once in a while, I do pass a true blue beach house. Yea, it’s a bit older, not as monstrous, but if you saw a picture, it would scream “beach”. (And if you are the type to hear screaming from pictures, please keep that to yourself.) I’m not going to try to describe this much more, but I will just leave it with the ever vague clichés of “you know what I am talking about” and “you know what I mean”.

I guess I am just used to beach houses being a bit smaller. Most of the shacks I have rented haven’t been gihugic spaces, but they were more than adequate; and we had a blast there nonetheless. But I guess they are slowly on the way out. I don’t know, I guess kids today will see these newer, bigger and far more expensive houses and think, “yea, that’s a real beach house.”

The sun is shinin’/It’s here to wake me up
No one around/Just me and the sky

The sky is cloudless, and even though this isn’t the beach, it’s still pretty calm. I pass some people on their porch, just eating breakfast or reading the paper. Occasionally, I do pass a dog, which makes me miss Bauer terribly. I try to pet as many as I can. A lot of people down here aren’t dog friendly. A lot of yards have various cute signs asking owners to curb their dog somewhere else. Others have wood figures of a dog; some of them even have a poop coming out. They either say NO or have the circle with the line running through it. Now if I was a dog, and I saw what I thought to be another pooch cutting a deuce on a lawn, I would take that as a cue to cut one right there. If you really wanna keep a dog off of your lawn, have a big cut out of Michael Vick.

It’s their right, too. A lot of yards are meticulously kept. Edged, watered, the whole deal. I get the point, because it can’t be easy growing grass on sandy soil. Flags are a big thing, too. Lots of American flags (July 4th is 3 days away.) I also see a trend of a lot of college flags. Not just your obvious ones, but loser schools like ‘Philadelphia University’, ‘James Madison’, ‘Rutgers’, etc. Any of you guys heard of these schools? Sound like party schools to me.

I interval about 30 blocks, then start my stroll back up. There is no better feeling than not having to rush. There’s only 4 screaming little girls waiting, so why hurry. I drink in the scene; sky, houses, flags, porches and decks. It’s not the ocean, but I will associate these sights with the music in my iPod. It’s funny, I wasn’t feeling terribly active to start, but as it wore on, I felt more energized. I came back ready to go to the beach, and do some running around there, too.

The next morning, I didn’t quite fell like going for another run (cough, wuss,cough) Instead, I decided to go for a walk north. Going at a slower pace, these new-fangled houses just seemed bigger. As I kept going up, I saw the boardwalk was starting up, do it was a no-brainer to go there. Wow, just wow. I can still vividly remember going to where the boards start, and just looking out to the ocean, with the sun reflecting off of it.

I’m already in/In a daydream
The sky is callin’/It’s callin’ out my name
Telling me to stay/Stay, don’t go away

Now this part of the Bwalk is narrow, very narrow. Like dangerously narrow. Bikers are whizzing by like Lance Armstrong. Runners are cutting their way through the show moving crowd of people like me. Yea, I see no need to run now. I have the sweet ocean to my right, and soon enough, this week will have gone by. Why rush it? Still, all this fast movement is annoying. Here I am trying to stay out of the way, only to get bumped by some runner, and the bikers are so close, I can fell the air coming off of them.

I kinda worry, ‘cause some of these bikes are of the 2 man variety. So here are people that usually don’t ride bikes, let alone the 2 mans, whizzing through the walkers and the elderly, and the elderly using walkers. It got so bad, I saw some motard with their young daughter on the back of the bike. This kid was young enough that she should have been in a baby seat. But, no, SuperParent already made the decision that precious little Madison or Haley or whoever the fuck should be able to ride on the back. Even though her feet didn’t reach the pedals. But she did look so precious in the 3 dollar bike helmet.

So I watch as these 2 zoom by me. I watch as the dad slides all the way over, and even bounces off a bench. He has a yellow Live Strong t-shirt on, so he thinks he can drive as reckless as he can. After bouncing off the bench, he rolls up to 2 elderly couples walking. Clearly, these guys are not going top speed, but Dad rides right up to them before realizing this fact. He yells for his daughter to hit the breaks. It’s too late, he swerves. He viciously takes out a woman, as the bike slides down to the boardwalk. The bike keeps going and wipes out like 5 more people. It was carnage, all for an asshole driver.

OK, I totally made that last part up. There’s not enough jokes in this story, so I thought a made up bit with a young child getting hurt would make you sick perverts laugh.

Soon, the actual Boardwalk-the part with stores, etc- starts. This is a good thing, ‘cause I gotta pee like a race horse at this point. It’s just a very cool vibe to me. People just strolling around, ocean breeze blowing up. All kinds of stores selling all kinds of stuff. Sure, after a while, it all gets repetitive, but it beats the continued Wal-Martization of everywhere else. It’s just so laid back. Every new SummerSong that comes up on my iPod is meshed with another scene of summer. Even though it’s the 4th of July week, it’s not crowded at all. It’s hard to not feel like a little kid. Arcades still abound. If I had a sense of smell, I am sure I could smell the cotton candy, popcorn, pizza, etc. It’s also at this point the Old Friends post starts. (Pretty damn cool how I am keeping this whole thing linear, huh?)

It feels like it’s starting to get ‘late’. I can’t quite figure out why; there’s no need for a clock at all this week. I guess it’s because there is still so much ‘nothing’ to do back at the house. Go to the beach, read, play soccer and lacrosse, go into the ocean. It’s still early, and at least I have some of the boards scouted for cool places to go. And, of course, exactly where Mario Brothers is.

And the breeze is blowing/Blowin’ across my face
Well, I just don’t know where/But I wish I could be there
Just for a little while

So even though I didn’t run, I walked, and I got to see the ocean. It still totally relaxed me. I don’t know how it does it, but the beach does it every time. And this peace will last a little bit longer when I go back to the house with the 4 girls. But I am so better off for doing this. Makes me a better person somehow. I am just different at the beach/ocean/bay. I am somehow better. I feel free-er, more at one in my skin. I feel inspired to somehow bottle all this up, and try to let it go by writing about it.

The next day, I decide to actually run on the beach. Wow, this is a different world. It’s a totally different feel than what I have been used to. The best place is to run down by the water’s edge. The iPod provides all the musical mood I need. I see all kinds of things on the beach that I wonder about. So many in fact, I have another post planned for that. (Damn, is that a smooth segue or what?) I interval down about 25 blocks, where I see an abandoned pier just jutting out into the ocean. Those pictures are in the new Beachology album I put up this morning. For some reason, this just struck me as very cool. So on our last adult walk, I dragged T down there with me to take all those pics. Remember how I was busting on all those papa-razzi at the amusement park snapping dozens of pics? Yea, as you can see, that applies to me, too.

Now if I had an ending, I would put it here. But since I don’t have an ending, guess what? It’s still gonna be right here. Yea, I know, there wasn’t a ton of jokes, and I apologize. I just wanted to make you feel like you were there, seeing what I see, feeling what I feel, running/ walking right next to me. In which case, next time bring some more Gatorade for the runs, eh?