from Cape Cod: leaving

I have an afternoon flight home.

Cape Cod… It was just a taste, really. Oh, but what a taste! You can do an intense amount of sampling in a short spell.

Barnstable oysters, Chatham scallops…









Salt on your face.

Chocolate in your room, a cookie with nanna’s home made raspberry jam. (Our Brewster Inn by the Sea hosts worry about this amount of detail. It feels heavenly to be attended to so well… Because really, in the course of the everyday, you can only slug through the hours and hope that you’ll have the time to do a load of laundry.)

A morning of drizzle and cool mists. It was supposed to be the reverse – a bleak Saturday and a better Sunday. We won in the switch.

A quick run over to the marshes. Wet shoes now and hair that’s starting to clamp down. Misty, salty dampness. Just one more look at the sea, there, beyond the still bare brambles.





At the Inn though, I see that the forsythia is popping shoots of yellow. And the double daffodils are full of lemon yellow ruffles.









We sit down to breakfast. Fruits, juices, scones, a frittata and for me – scrambled eggs with fresh herbs – dill, parsley, chives, along with granola.





I’m restless. I pick up a paper, a book, I put them both down. My tolerant breakfast buddy watches me with amusement.

It’s the departure that weighs on me. I’ll never get used to this part of being a far-away parent.

We talk about our forthcoming vacations, our week ahead. In the car, we play music that was so often my Sunday morning routine, even as the daughters were very young. Nessun dorma, nessun dorma…






In Cambridge, she turns toward her home and I catch the T to the airport.