Grackles

 January 26, 2026

Breakfast at the Drop In, still bright with Christmas lights. The “Red-neck Home Fries” was immense, and I may have finished a third of it. Walked to the end of the pier. Strolling seaward in the sunshine was comfortable, but walking back with the cold wind blasting from the continent was a tribulation. Encountered a woman named Logan, who I thought looked familiar, so I called to her, which was a mistake. She pursued me thereafter, wanting to talk about being seen by God and about “the only name of God’  acknowledged by the scriptures.” I made my getaway. People who open with some nicety of theology known only to them and their little group are always liars. The pier was thronged as it normally is by grackles, but the abnormal things was that every one of them was male. Where were the lady grackles? One imagines them saying, “You go out in that blast if you want to; I’m staying home by the fire.” Cut a day off my stay, going home tomorrow rather than Wednesday. There’s not that much to do here– but eat and drink– when the weather is bad. This allows me what most people would call a real vacation, just lounging about, with no anxiety about getting my money’s worth out of the local attractions. Whirlwinds of pale sand on the edge of the beach. 

Evening: The lady who sat defiantly in a deck chair on the beach all the windy day folds her chair and retreats at fall of darkness. The white volleyball net shimmers out of the gathering dusk.