It's just different out here.
I knew it immediately that day on Stinson Beach, North of San Francisco. I was just a little crummy when I opened the door of the old Packard and ran straight out over the sand to where the waves rolled up to my toes. I was grinning like a fool I guess, but I'd never seen big water; a pond maybe; a river; but this!
We had just arrived from Northern Wisconsin and my Dad had stated that we would move “as far west as possible”.
Thus Stinson Beach. And I've been 'out here' ever since.
“Away out here they got a name, for rain and wind and fire. The rain is Tess, the fire Joe, And they call the wind Maria”
Tess was afoot this week. She paid a visit down along the Mexican coast at Cabot San Lucas, and really let herself go last weekend, flooding the town and destroying order. Then She moved on to Arizona leaving her card up there, in the mountains; and left a couple of feet of water gushing down arroyos, carrying off houses and topsoil, tearing up towns and freeways.
Joe was out too, burning tens of thousands of acres of California’s forest, terrorizing Deer and Coyote, catching the squirrel off guard and chasing the Cougar.
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But Maria. She was right here. In San Diego. This lovely place were it never rains and seldom allows Maria to kick up here heels. But kick 'em up she did; and not all over town either. Just right here over Montgomery field. She didn't knock down trees all over the city; didn't throw debris up and down the roads; didn't disrupt the ball games and send everyone for cover. Nope. She just sat down here at Montgomery field and played with the airplanes.
She picked 'em up, swung 'em around, landed 'em and did it again. And again. And again.
“Maria blows the stars around, and sends the clouds a’flyin”
So it's a mess now. Airplanes strewn left and right. Hanging on fences and draped over cars. You'd hate to see it. It's been so beautiful around here all these years that we feel a little violated.
“Before I knew Maria’s name and heard her wail and whinin’ I had a girl and she had me and the sun was always shinin”
But I won't be leaving. It's just too beautiful. The weather's perfect, I don't own a coat, rain or otherwise; I can plan the next outdoor stuff weeks in advance. And OK, the traffic is a little heavy, but it does 80.
And away from here I fear I'd be a little lost.
“And then one day I left my girl I left her far behind me
And now I’m lost, so gone and lost, not even God can find me.”
(Lyrics by Alan Lerner / music by Frederick Loewe for their 1951 Broadway musical, Paint Your Wagon)
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