Sunday Afternoon—March 23—Long Beach
Corniche. This morning, this word greeted me and the very sound of it felt friendly. It means ‘a road cut into the edge of a cliff, especially one running along a coast’, well if that is not the bees knees. Is it a sign? One can hope.
Yes, I am settled in my Long Beach abode, for sleep and early morning rituals, BUT/AND, almost ten weeks now since the fire and ‘on reviewing the situation’ (thank you, ‘Oliver!’), I have found that rhythm is essential to one’s well-being…hence my personal practice of leaving Malibu mid morning, driving down PCH to Santa Monica and Marina Del Rey for meetings and writing and sea lions, and then returning to my Shangri-la filled with golden light filtering and dappling figs and lemons and lazy lizards, careening hawks, and singing birds.
And so, from here i n Long Beach, I do this. I’ve added 20 miles onto the trek, I don’t care. I find peace in familiarity of the community that has remained..Trader Joe’s, Thyme Cafe and my pelicans, tiny sea birds and sea lions. Then…yes, two hours at least for the drive ‘home’, but the heart, the heart needs what the heart needs and I am grateful.
Having said this…CORNICHE…even though it sounds a bit like a crusty topped muffin to me…it is now a north star. A road cut into the edge of a cliff, running along the coast…my cliff? a new cliff? I’m open. I’m ready when it calls and meanwhile this word feels warm and sweet.