I’ve been on the road for 2 weeks now. I’ve slept in my van in grocery store parking lots, picking ticks off my face that must have crawled out of my painting gear as I slept. I’ve wrestled the sun and cursed at the wind. My back is tired, my feet ache, my lips are chapped, and the distinct itch of poison oak is catching up with me from a week of exposure. I’m heading home tomorrow, but today I am here.

The sun had grown tired of my grumbling and refused to join me for this last effort. The waters will not be illuminated today. The air is full of mist. My mind is full of other places I’d like to be. Home, mostly. But today I am here.

One last round with mother nature. It’s not a victory song, it’s funeral march, as Leonard Cohen would say, it’s a cold and it’s a broken Hallelujah.

I long to see this coast in another light, on another day, and perhaps I will in the not too distant future. But today I am here, and I cannot deny this moment. There is joy in the muted earth, joy in the slow passage of time, joy in the rumble of ocean below.

But I also cannot deny the joy of completion. Stick a fork in it. I’m done.