Gold and Green: A Walk on the Coast

Someone asked me the other day what I’ve been cooking lately and I had to admit that I haven’t been. Not at all. Food these days is thrown together, quickly tossed or chopped or mixed. Half the time I'm eating out of the salad bowl. This is what happens when deadlines loom and there isn’t time to be creative about what you are having for dinner because all your creative energy is going elsewhere.

These days I am biting into end of summer plums, eating avocado drizzled with soy sauce (good grief this is good), and munching on radishes. I am still loving those zucchini noodles, and savoring the last of the tomatoes with black olive tapanade.

But mostly these days I am living in my head, a place that is jammed with facts and figures and quotes from interviews and quite a bit of anxiety that I won’t be able to pull things together the way I want. It’s a little claustrophobic in there, if truth be told.

That is why I was so very lucky to be able to escape last week. To hide out in a bare bones cabin in a beautiful spot, to avoid the phones and the email inbox and do nothing but write and sleep and nibble on the apples I bought from a nearby farmstand. And in the afternoon, when I began to go cross-eyed from staring at the computer screen too much, I’d grab a jacket and a baseball cap and go for a walk.

I don’t have much to share with you in the way of food this week, but perhaps you’d like to join me on a walk.

To get to the trailhead you have to drive down a narrow road that runs on a cliff alongside the ocean.



And walk through a stand of the tallest eucalyptus trees. They sway in the wild, the branches groaning and squeaking (squeaking, it’s true) against each other.



You walk into the light.



Until you reach the edge of the cliff, the waves rolling in far below.



The ocean is so vast, the setting sun so liquid and golden, it makes you feel small. Even though your shadow is thrown large against the hills.



And the hills, oh the hills. They stir my heart.



Everywhere there are colors, patterns.



The coast here is rugged, the cliffs jutting out of the water. The rocks are beautiful, the colors autumnal.



There are even bunny rabbits in them thar hills. But remember, we’re not talking about dinner today, I don’t want you to get any ideas about Mr. Fuzzy-tail here.



The sun begins to go down.



It turns the foliage golden. Especially those flowers, which are called “sticky monkey flowers,” believe it or not.



And the sun sinks into the ocean, turning the sky to pink and blue.



And you walk back in the dark, through the eucalyptus trees still groaning and squeaking (a bit spooky, if truth be told). And down the narrow road, back to the computer and the work that is there waiting.

This post is dedicated to two extraordinary women.
A big thank you to my mother, who has a special talent for finding the most beautiful spots and is generous enough to share them with me.
And my dear Quaz, whose birthday—in the midst of manuscript madness—completely slipped my mind. I am so sorry, my friend. The only way this walk could have been better is if you had been there with me.