Not All Who Wander Are Lost

Now that we're even somewhat settled, and before it fades completely, a quickflash compendium of moments and motifs from our homeless summer.

All-time concert count is up to 204 after a suprisingly low-key Falcon Ridge Folk Fest. Saw much less music than usual, in part because of kid demands, and in part because the bill was overflowing with humor acts. Some ex-student-now-friends camped alongside us, which broadened the living room out a bit, too. Nothing new thrilled me, but Crooked Still, Ani and Dar were good as always. Eddie from Ohio, listing themselves as "from Ohio" due to the family-emergency loss of drummer Eddie, turn out to be much more fun with a drummer.

Of course, we go to folkfests to work as much as to frolic, but check-in isn't a hard crew. A couple of hours each day I sat under a huge tent in the thick of entryflow, checked in, chatted up, and braceleted many coolfolks, from Chris Smither to John Pousette-Dart to Julie of Eddie from Ohio. Best fest workmoments this year revolved around famous people's families: Julie's kids were hilarious, Alistair Mook's parents seemed happily befuddled, and did you know Lowen (of "and Navarro" fame) and his new wife have five eleven-year-olds between them?

Was weird to move from field to million-dollar tourist towns and quirky, spacious rental housing. But other than a heck of a lot of late afternoons rockhunting at beaches, I've already blogged the day to day stuff about our two-week on Cape Cod.

Incidentally, best fine dining on the Cape: Dennisport poshteraunt Ocean House. The duck tacos in avacado dressing and hoisin BBQ sauce are to die for, as is the unsullied waterview at dusk.

Similarly:

Best low-tide walking beaches are on the bayside near Dennis; best ocean-side beaches are west of Orleans, though Marconi still rocks.

Provincetown, Oak Bluff, and other name-brand townships have been overrun by mostly successful brandgrabbers. Head to authentic towns like Welfleet and Sandwich. Unless you like crowds and cloneshops.

Do boil your own lobsters. Buy pie from roadside stands, and corn when it's in season.

Check for ticks and poison ivy.

Of course, if you've gotta be homeless for a summer, doin' it in style helps compensate for the lack of a center. Six weeks since we lost house-and-vocation and hit the road, and we're neither exhausted nor lost. It hasn't even rained on us since that quick hilarious hour holding up the camper awning while all around us fellow campers chased their rolling tents fulltilt downhill like so many tumbleweeds.

I could go on forever, but all else is truly mundania: the dead car battery, the health insurance limbo unique to the seasonal worker between gigs, tag on the lawn at dusk with the wife and three year old, small white dog nipping at our heels. Suffice it to say, life is good. Here's hoping this warm consistent wind that wafts us gently towards the morestable future is sustainable.

Comments:

heh heh heh

Flip Flops

:)

I can have so much fun picking on you about that

# posted by

Shaw Israel Izikson : 12:18 AM, August 11, 2005

I love Eddie From Ohio (who, I am pretty sure, are actually from Virginia). They used to play at Sweet Briar every year. I am so jealous that you met Julie. Who is Lowen and how do they possibly have 5 eleven year olds?

You certainly had a way more exciting summer than I did.

# posted by

Lady Strathconn : 7:33 AM, August 11, 2005

"Best low-tide walking beaches are on the bayside near Dennis; best ocean-side beaches are west of Orleans, though Marconi still rocks."

I would submit the Brewster bay-side beach as a strong contender. The tidepools which run between the sand beach and the miles of exposed sandbar are teeming with hermit crabs, snails, and crabs. The seagulls have learned to snatch up a large snail, ascend to 40-50 feet, and drop them as if they had Norden Bomb Sights onto exposed rocks. Walking or sitting dreamily, it is wonderful.

# posted by

Anonymous : 9:13 AM, August 20, 2005