A Cape Cod Notebook

My fun on the Cape is almost exclusively of the solitary kind. Exploring a new beach, taking my bike on the rail trail and stopping for ice cream at the Pleasant Lake General Store. Or making repairs to my cottage.

July is coming quickly, so it’s almost time for my gardening motivation to go into hibernation.

Isn’t everything we make temporary in the grand scheme of things? My day to day work is to promote historic preservation on Nantucket. We talk about preserving things in perpetuity. But on an eroding pile of sand, perpetuity is a relative term.

One of the most beautiful spots in Wellfleet, or for that matter, on the entire Lower Cape, is Old Wharf Road. It is one of those headlands that, along with Indian Neck and Lieutenant’s Island, thrust out into greater Wellfleet Harbor.

Wellfleet journalist Seth Rolbein talks about the birthplace of American Theatre.

As we drove off, disappointed, I said I don’t want to JUST be on Cape Cod. I want to feel like I’m here, really here, sand between my toes, waves crashing, gulls calling out for a meal.

We are running out of space at the Nantucket landfill. I spent the winter driving by dumpsters, unable to stop myself from looking over the edge.

Despite what might be in your head, the 25-mile path from Yarmouth to Wellfleet is not just a bike trail. There are runners and skateboarders and walkers, many of us with dogs.

What really impresses me at this time of year, at any time of year, actually, are the lichens. These otherworldly beings, growing on tree bark and branches, spreading on the ground or on rocks or gravestones, seem to thrive in any weather.