I Break for Sunsets
by Cappy Hall Rearick
On the day I left California, I was a dead ringer for a happy/sad drama mask. Happy to be trading the complexities of the Vanity Capital of the World for what I hoped would be a simpler lifestyle, yet not so happy to be leaving my home of the past sixteen years.
But a funny thing happened when I arrived on the east coast: Carrabelle, a Florida Panhandle fishing village on the Gulf of Mexico happened. It didn’t take long for me to figure out that I had found my new, if temporary home.
Before leaving California, I bought a Jeep and named it “Toto.” I packed it solid with boxes of books, typing paper and computer essentials, all the necessary writer stuff I tend to drag along a with me wherever I go.
Since I was traveling by myself, it was necessary for me to unload everything all by my lonesome once I got to the cottage I’d rented overlooking the Gulf. I counted twenty-two steps straight up to the house. No wonder I was exhausted by the time all my stuff was scattered throughout my new digs. By late afternoon, I was exhausted. I looked around at the mess I had managed to create and realized that I was way overdue for a deserved break that included a nice glass of wine. From the Napa or Sonoma Valley, of course.
With wine glass in hand, I wandered out to the spacious deck just as the sun was beginning to set and just in time for the evening performance.
As I watched from my private box seat, heaven’s quiet company of players moved silently, swiftly onto the stage in preparation for Opening Night.
Evening shades of purple, pink, gold and blue executed a slow dissolve in front of me. Performing sea birds pirouetted with practiced grace, dipping into the liquid gold of the Gulf anticipating an early supper. Their scrawny legs gently floated down and perched on a nearby dune while they checked me out ... their audience of one on a nearby deck.
Every now and then, I heard a dog bark somewhere off in the distance as if cheering for nature’s twilight performance. Surrounding trees whistled their appreciation and boundless waves clapped in applause as the curtained sky slowly dropped rainbowed hues of eventide.
Mother Nature was performing a personal welcome just for me, one I had least expected.
Traffic on the Ventura Freeway in Los Angeles would be starting the four o’clock rumble. The thought intruded, then just as quickly was thrown headlong into the ocean breeze when yet another palette of colors brushed the top of the sea to capture my attention and my heart.
I lingered on the deck totally captivated. All my troubles seemed to vanish along with the weariness of the long cross-country drive. Lost in the moment, I was in harmony with nature, at one with God and the Universe. I was at peace in the knowledge that I had come home, and that I was breaking for a Southern sunset.
