Beauty... and a simpler time

Merely a year and a week ago I was enjoying a few days at the shore with my Dad. It was about 3 days of simple pleasures: mini-golf, soft-serve ice cream, walking the boardwalk, splashing in the surf, and relaxing on the sand. Lest I forget: pinball, skee-ball, shopping for souvenirs, and Thrasher's boardwalk fries. The scorching summer heat had departed, but the weather was still ideal for being where we were.

Despite my concerted efforts, I never did get to the shore this year. Even had an offer from Dad to go again, but I was really wanting to go with peeps my own age, or thereabouts. We probably would've been there this weekend. But instead I find myself preparing my apartment and my affairs to spend who knows how many of the upcoming days and weeks by my parents' side as my Dad goes through another surgery for the rare cancer that we hoped and thought for the last 3 years would not come back.

With that in mind, I'd like to revisit the simple things and the beauty I managed to capture during those short few seaside days. Let's start with the beauty first. I hope these shots manage to inspire you, too, to a renewed appreciation of this sort of beauty. I keep getting wakeup calls not to take these sights and such time for granted.

(All photos taken in Ocean City, Maryland, on September 10, 2004.)

If you've ever been to OCMD, you've probably seen these Christian-themed sand sculptures that are done & re-done probably every day. They are almost always inspiring, but I never saw them quite the way the light and the dusk sky happened to combine around them that evening.

The sun disappears for the night above the inlet. Spectacular.