“Remoted – Hybrid” – Day 891 (Tuesday) – beach day

Short Sands Beach,
York, ME.

Beach day was a good time. Mom and I arrived in York, Maine and parked the car at 10:45. It was breezy and cool at the beach. Cool, as in, I unrolled the sleeves of my shirt to their longest point over my wrists and debated adding another layer. 

The sun was shining, the sky was blue, the hard packed wet sand was dark gray, and the water was shades of green and blue. Kids rode the waves on boards as we walked toward the shallow water. We couldn't be at the beach and not at least get our feet wet.

We spent time in York most of the years of my youth, but Long Sands Beach was always our beach of choice. Once or twice, we shared a rental unit with Mummu, but usually it was my nuclear family camping in a tent for a week. In addition to the camping week, we often took day trips to York, arriving extra early to score parking on the street, making us amongst the first few people on the beach at 9:00 in the morning.

Hard packed wet sand of York.

Long Sands Beach has houses across the street from the ocean. Mom said the absence of a boardwalk and all the money-sucking distractions that kids would want like candy, pizza, arcade games, and souvenirs made it the top choice of the family adults. 

We would pack Dad’s scratchy, olive-green wool Army blanket and a lunch of sandwiches made of deli meats or chopped ham and pickle salad. Chopped ham (or Spam) and pickle salad was not every day food at our house and was reserved for the beach picnic cooler and holiday parties.

Today, we unpacked our chairs and spent time on Short Sands Beach, near the shops, Goldenrod Kisses, and the arcade. Mom wondered why we hadn’t been to that beach before, but I pointed to the building marked “Fun O Rama,” said that was probably why, and reminded her of the conversation we had just had about boardwalks. 

After an hour on the beach, we were hungry for lunch and chose the restaurant at Goldenrod Kisses. Our timing was perfect, and we were seated immediately. Bowls of clam chowder fortified us for the next planned activity – When Pigs Fly Bakery. Some of their bread is sold in local grocery stores, just never the chocolate bread, which is the one I like, due to its exotic flavor and scarcity.  

Mom got a loaf of sourdough, which had us reminiscing about the loaves of frozen sourdough bread dough she would sometimes buy at the grocery store and bake at home. When she baked a loaf of the sourdough bread and set the warm loaf on the supper table, we would devour the entire loaf in one sitting. 

After the bakery, it was a quick stop at the outlets. Mom wanted some new casual shoes, which we found at the Clarks Bostonian outlet. The next stop was the Cole Haan outlet so I could check out the clearance rack. Ever since finding a pair of pink loafers at Cole Haan several years ago, I’ve wanted to return. An ad for the ØriginalGrand Wingtip Oxford has been haunting me for months, but the price (listed at $180) was soundly rejected by my wallet. Today, the coveted shoes with the hot pink sole were found on the clearance rack for $33.

Wingtips all in a row - first to latest.

The new Cole Haan wingtips are the fourth pair in what now appears to have become an obsession which started with a pair of Rockport black and white wingtips. Now that knee pain and a jacked up ankle make it difficult to wear my beloved heels, it’s loafers and wingtips and low-heeled booties for comfort and stability. 

With sun, sand, chowder, fresh bread, and shoes, the day with Mom was a success. Everybody was a winner.