Massachusetts: Summer's End

Falling in love again is a slow, steady, effortful process. After you lose a piece of yourself, it takes a constant sort of energy to unravel the tangled web that you call your personhood. To hold the frayed and tattered threads up to the light and examine each of them one by one, inch by inch, carefully imagining their place in the completed tapestry. In who you’ve become, and who you’re going to be. After leaving my twenties behind in Baltimore, it feels like I’ve lost a piece of myself, and I’m still recovering from it.

It’s no fault of the place I now find myself. Boston is as lovely as a new home can be. It’s been a dry summer; from my new hospital’s oncology ward solarium, the hills to the west are dense and verdant, and endless, bluebird skies have been shining down on us all August. I’m beginning to appreciate the terroir. The earthy, green smell of the Necklace as I cross over Longwood Avenue on my brief walk to work. The ever-changing light - each sunset now falling substantially earlier than the one before. The incredible character of my new Bostonian neighbors and colleagues, virtually all of whom are masked and distanced as the pandemic stretches into another season - a deep, stoic spirit of collective pride and mutual support that could have only been engendered by decades’ memories of the New England winter. Sure enough, and lucky for me, this place feels like a place. Which is more than one can say for… certain places in this country.

And yet, when I wake up in the morning, and hear the bubbling courtyard fountain in place of East Baltimore’s ambulance sirens, helicopters, and ice cream trucks, I can’t help but feel - weird as it sounds - that a thread of me is missing. I’m taking new photographs now (beautiful ones, too) but they don’t yet strum at my heartstrings or evoke an entire life dreamt, built, and lived to completion - the way my images from eight years in Maryland do.

But I’m learning. I’m going to fall in love again. It’s going to take intentionality, and the passage of time. During the week, my new job takes me away from thoughts of the past. I throw myself willingly into the work of supporting seriously ill patients and their families - and am stunned, gratified, grateful, to discover that the full-time stuff is just as meaningful as I always hoped it would be. It makes sense - sitting or kneeling by the hospital bed is the place in my life that has changed the least. Here is one thread that remains, that I hope will become woven more tightly, intricately, and beautifully over time. And during the weekend, when there is time and space to reflect, I’m choosing to do it where I always have: outdoors, at sunrise, beside a lake, within the eternal, forgiving woods.

———

To wit, photographs from our weekend walks in August:

August 15, 2020: A early morning jaunt in the Fells, around Quarter Mile Pond and to Pickerell Point. Horrid light - a heavy bank of clouds rolls in just before sunrise. Still, I can imagine some lovely golden hours in the future from the south shore of Spot Pond, looking out toward Great Island. I use my polarizer to photograph the lily pads on Quarter Mile Pond before we quit the lakeside, visiting our local Wegman’s for the first time.

August 22, 2020: A spontaneous evening visit to the south bank of the Charles River in Allston for sunset. Lovely colors and lovely clouds. Birch trees. Boaters. Beer garden. A birthday party with rowdy children. A Canada goose with a broken wing.

August 23, 2020: A ramble, shortly after sunrise, at the Breakheart Reservation. I can tell, rather quickly, that this is going to be one of my new favorite places. We circumambulate the forest path around Silver Lake (Upper Pond), photographing the pine-clad island at its center as the morning light shifts and changes. The compositional opportunities here are endless.

August 30, 2020: Another morning walk around the Lynn Woods, along the south shore of (the less famous, non-Thoreau) Walden Pond and through the Great Woods, and to the top of Mount Gilead.

Cape Cod: Chatham & Yarmouth

The third and final day of our trip, and it’s a lazy one. We’re up again before 5 AM, driving a short distance southward on the highway to catch sunrise from the parking area at the top of Fort Hill, just off the highway a few miles to the south of our motel. Past a series of old colonial houses, their yards decorated by whale jawbone gates, we arrive at a beautiful, panoramic viewpoint just as the skies are beginning to brighten. To the east, past Salt Pond Bay and the outer beach, a sanguine sun is beginning to crest the Atlantic Ocean. To the north, the house at Coast Guard Station, sitting high on backshore bluff, begins to gradually catch the light. And to the south, boats sit placidly in Town Cove, overlooked by the oceanfront houses of Orleans. I set up my tripod a short distance back down the hill from the parking area, using an old wooden fence as a foreground object of interest as the first rays of sunlight beginning to strike the backing vegetation, marshes, and waterways curving into the horizon.

After sunrise, we drive a short distance north to the parking area above Nauset Light Beach, which was completely full when we first swung by on the first morning of our trip. Today, at just before 6 AM, the lot is all but empty, and we leave our car their to leisurely admire the famous lighthouse, whose brilliant red-and-white façade adorns the exterior of so many potato chip bags across the country. I personally am finding lighthouse photography rather tricky; compared to shooting pure landscapes, there are simply not many interesting perspectives or angles for one to shoot a single, vertically prominent building at the edge of the sea. This is especially true outside of the golden hours, which provide interesting differential lighting and soft, colorful hues in the sky. Nevertheless, we make the best of the early morning light, take our selfies, and make a quick visit to the nearby Three Sisters Lighthouses before departing. On our short drive home, we stop by Hole in One Bakery & Coffee Shop for a breakfast of croissants, specialty donuts, and iced mochas.

Back at the motel, we have a leisurely breakfast (watching travel shows on TV) before checking out in the late morning. Scrapping our hiking plans for the day, we instead drive to the town pier in Wellfleet, where we see a cormorant catch an eel for lunch, as the local fishermen work the dock. We briefly browse the used books at the nearby, lovingly named Bookstore & Restaurant (an establishment after my very own heart!) before eating lunch next door - clams, a cod sandwich for Jane, and yet another lobster roll for me. Then, we’re back on the road, driving to the town of Chatham at the elbow of the Cape.

Chatham is a small but bustling little seaside village in the summer, even mid-week. We park off Main Street and set off browsing the stores. At the nearby bookstore, I pick up another title on my “to-buy” shortlist: Robert Finch’s Common Ground. Jane buys an iced lemonade, which we sip at to stay cool as we walk the mile toward the beach, admiring the town’s lovely homes and flower-filled yards along the way. A local kid, shuttling tourists on a golf cart for his summer job, eventually finds us and gives us a quick lift to the front of Chatham Light. We stop to photograph the lighthouse station, the nearby beach with its crystal-blue waters, and the omnipresent wild rose bushes, before making our way back into town.

Back on the road, we drive westward through the fishing villages of the Mid Cape, checking into our last night’s motel just east of the Bass River, in Dennis. After a perfunctory afternoon nap, we make our way to Skipper Chowder House, a famous seafood joint a few miles away, where we place a takeout order (more chowder, more seafood, and another… lobster roll). While waiting, we share what I can only describe as an absolutely sinful banana split (actual quote: “The chocolate fudge is… on the bottom. The bottom is all chocolate fudge. It’s all fudge”). Having eaten ourselves to oblivion back at our motel, we depart for a bayside sunset at Gray’s Beach, a short distance to the north through the town of Yarmouth. The marsh here is a photography hotspot because of its long, west-facing boardwalk, but between the throngs of summer visitors and the clouds of midges and marsh insects, it winds up being the least pleasant place I’ve photographed in awhile. Even with repellent, I come away with a disgusting number of little bites after taking some fast sunset shots. Were the photographs worth it? …. Someone else will have to be the judge.

The following morning, after a rather sleepless, muggy night in the motel, Jane and I walk the short distance up the road to the Bass River Bridge for sunrise. The insects are out again, and the air is preternaturally still, but I am able to get some nice shots of the nearby boat dock and the lovely houses facing us on the west bank of the river. We pack our bags back at the motel, and it’s a relatively brief (though somewhat… itchy) ride back to Boston by late morning.

Cape Cod: The Provincelands

"To my mind this region is at its best in twilight, for its dun floor gathers the dark long before the sunset colour has faded from the flattened sky, and one may then walk there in the peace of the earth gloom and hear from far below the great reverberation of the sea."

— Henry Beston (1888-1968)
The Outermost House

On our second day, we turn away from the bayside Cape and its marshes and wetlands to explore the Outer Cape and the pounding surf of the Atlantic shore. Driving out from our little motel in Eastham shortly after four in the morning, we reach Race Point Beach just before sunrise, at the curling, north-facing wrist of the Cape’s arm. This region, called the Provincelands, is a magnificent landscape of undulating bluffs backing a wind-blown shore - ever-shifting sand dunes capped by grasses and shrubs found in no other environment on Earth. Jane and I leave the National Seashore’s main parking lot and set off walking down Pole Line Road, a ATV track that cuts across the dunes toward the Race Point Lighthouse. As we head toward the southwest, the sun pokes up behind us, a glowing red orb appearing briefly on the horizon just beside the old ranger house on the bluffs, before disappearing into a bank of marine fog which lights the entire realm in a strange, lavender-pink glow. With each trudging step, our boots sink into the soft, billowing sand, as we are transported further and further out into the hinterlands; in this regard, walking up and down the dunes is tiring but rewarding. There is no better way to feel more alive, and more connected with world around you, than by walking out there with your own two feet, alone between the sand and the surf and the barely risen sun. We walk nearly two miles over the sand, taking frequent breaks to photograph dune plants in the early morning light, before reaching the lighthouse at the tip of the Cape. There, we get expansive views of Hatches Harbor, Herring Cove Beach off to the south, and the pounding lines of breakers rolling in onto the foreshore of Race Point Beach. After taking our selfies and landscape shots, we retrace our steps back to the car - about an hour of walking in each direction.

It is still early morning as we drive back toward the Lower Cape, but traffic into Provincetown is picking up. We make a brief, regrettable stop at the Pilgrim Spring trailhead, where we attempt a short woodland walk that we abort after just a few minutes, driven back by a swarm of mosquitoes and a multitude of bites that picaridin is powerless to prevent. Further south along the highway, we also pay a quick visit to the Highland Lighthouse that stands tall above the bluffs of the Outer Cape. The structure itself is under renovation, making me quite glad that I didn’t visit it at sunrise, as originally intended. After this, we drive back to Eastham for breakfast, after which a short, late-morning nap is in order.

Shortly after noon, we set off in the car again, with the plan to spend the back half of the day in Provincetown. After 30 minutes on the Cape highway, we arrive at MacMillan Pier, where we park the car to go exploring on foot. Dodging foot traffic and car traffic in the city center’s narrow streets (pandemic notwithstanding, the summer throngs are quite present, though generally well-masked and adhering to distancing as much as feasible), we end up buying ice cream, followed by a cup of chowder and a burger from a seafood stand. This is followed by visits to two bookstores and a multitude of gift shops, where as tradition demands, we acquire our usual trip magnet along with another book on my shortlist: Mary Oliver’s Pulitzer Prize-winning American Primitive. Continuing west on Commercial Street, we pass by brightly decorated storefronts, and front yards overflowing with hydrangea blossoms in every color.

Even under the heavy sheen of sunscreen, fried seafood, and saltwater taffy, Provincetown has a loveliness all to its own. Historically the maritime capital at the very tip of the Cape, Provincetown retains all the trappings of its Portuguese fishing and whaling heritage, which it subsequently has married to a more modern, artistic sensibility. Former home to introspective rebels like Anthony Bourdain and Mary Oliver, the town today is an LGBTQ+ mecca, accommodating to summer visitors but self-assured of its sense of beauty and community regardless of the time of year. It’s a lovely place to take a walk.

At the end of Commercial Street, Jane and I climb onto the causeway that crosses the water to Wood End, a narrow tombolo that encircles the Provincetown Harbor and fronts the open bay to the west. It’s about mile - almost an hour of hopping over the boulders under the glaring mid-day sun - from one end to the other. On the other side, we make our way across the dunes, past an accompanying profusion of wild rose bushes speckled with colorfu rose hips, which have all the appearance of little round beach tomatoes. As we trek a short distance up the beach, Jane stops to admire the massive quahog and mussel shells that dot the sand (easily the biggest we’ve ever seen), while I forge on ahead to photograph the Wood End Lighthouse, at the curling fingertip of the Cape. After taking our usual selfies, we return to the causeway and cross back to Provincetown. In the harbor, now at the lowest point of the tide, the water has receded like a river draining into the bay, revealing sand flats speckled with shellfish and other intertidal creatures. The swarms of screaming gulls and shearwaters, along with flocks of sandal-clad humans on the sand, attest that this means feeding time for all involved.

Back in town, having exhausted the water supply from our hiking pack, Jane and I stumble into Spiritus Pizza where we quench our thirst with lemonade, an ice cream float, and lime rickey, accompanied by slices of cheese and spinach pizza. After dinner, we make our way back through the crowds to the pier. On the beach, a colorful sunset is underway, and a nearby dance club is pounding away with an outdoor fashion show. We take a few last photos before returning to the car and driving back to Eastham, where we settle in for an early night.