One day, Allison and I drove out to Montauk. It took us 3 hours to get there, 3 to get back – if you’ve been to Montauk then you know that the last stretch, and it’s a long stretch, is two-lane blacktop. If there’s traffic, and there always is, there’s no way to escape. It’s just the one damn road. It’s a bit long for a day-trip from the city proper. But never mind. We had a great time. I love it when the suburbs start to fall away, when the towns really fall away, and you are in true Beach Town mode. I grew up in a beach town. The comfort I feel in beach towns (I should clarify: East Coast beach towns – California beach towns are different. Not better/worse – just that something about the Pacific and the California coast-line – even the sand – is just different, not a landscape I instantly sink into like “ahhhh I know this.”) So suddenly the road out to the Hamptons gets beachier and beachier – less and less inhabited – the businesses you see along the road are less boutique-y and more bait-and-tackle.
And then there’s this. A clam bar. We stopped and ate. We had been on the road so long it felt like we must be at LEAST in Indiana by now.
We didn’t drive out there in the height of the summer season, so there were places to sit, and we soaked up the rays, and the sound of the ocean wind whipping through all those umbrellas. I imagine on a hot July day this place would be so packed you’d just drive right on by.
It looks like a field of yellow flowers.
It was so striking!