The Beach

So my parents are off to the beach. They make the three hour drive to their house in South Bethany every weekend from about April until October. My father is 90, and he didn't wear a seat belt until he was about 85 when he got pulled over for speeding in his red BMW convertible. The cop was so astounded at his age that he let him go on the speeding, but he gave him a ticket for not wearing a belt. That's what got him. Not the years of my mother nagging, but the $25 ticket. My mother can't stand the drive, or the sand, the sun, the water or the wind. She hates the beach. My father loves it -all of it. My mother hates the way my father drives. He is a big proponent of relaxing with one finger on the wheel and cruise control, and if the exit for Route 50 is coming up, and he has to cross four lanes of 495 at the last minute and cut off a dump truck- it doesn't bother him a bit.

Sometimes they stop at Jimmy's Grill. My mother likes that. She gets at least one soft shell crab sandwich once a year. They always stop at Short Brother's farm market. It is one of the tiniest markets on the road- no advance signs, no wind gadgets- it just appears near the Delaware line. Diane, who is the ever present farmer's wife, knows my whole family and will report on one member to another as we go by. She will pick you out the best corn or a good melon if you ask her. My father will take my kids to the barn to look at the horses. He knows the whole family. Everybody gets back in the car. When we go past a graveyard, my father will say -do you know how many dead people there are in there? The answer is: all of them.

They have been going to the Eastern Shore since there was ferry instead of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. Back then they couldn't afford to spend the night. Much later, when I was around, we stayed at the Delmar Hotel in Ocean City, MD- the great old kind with a dining room and rocking chairs on the double decker porch. You slept in saggy beds with your brother, and you both had to cling the edges to keep from landing in the middle. One time when I was about four, my father got a huge splinter in his foot walking on the boardwalk. He had to go to the hospital in Salisbury. The thought just makes me cringe even now.

My parents have had a beach house since the late sixties when ocean front property was cheap and risky. They used to rent it all summer, and we would go every weekend in the winter. Every day was cold and windy. For a kid, It was grim. Now they can afford not to rent, and eveyone in the family loves it there except for my mother. The only problem is my father always has a project or two- from screen repair to retiling the kitchen floor. If you are a male guest you might not make it down to the sand. Once one of my children wanted to know why their Daddy was the only one not on the beach. My father had decided that weekend that the deck railing was looking shabby, but if you ripped out all the nails and flipped the boards over, it would look good as new...

My mother occupies herself with planning all the meals and cooking up a storm, and hopefully a cocktail hour or two. Even if you have killed yourself all day trying to replace a garage door, you will be well fed. How my parents stay married through all these years is one of the last wonders of the world. I say hats off to my mother who grits her teeth and climbs into that car every Friday. As long as her VCR is working, she'll make it through another long weekend, and another year of marriage.