Respite in a Place Where Tides, Ponies Fascinate

Before the rush of the season, our family took a brief weekend retreat in the South. Partly it was just a breather prior to a busy summer that will zoom by at ever-increasing speed. In another part, it was to return to a place where we spent part of our honeymoon 35 years ago.
Three and a half decades have brought changes to that once-sleepy island where ponies and oysters are the main attractions. There is still not much to do, if one is taken to “night life,” which we are not.
The place is becoming gentrified, sad to say. Some of the tiny stores of old have become art galleries and T-shirt shops. Other mundane stores are brightly colored shops peddling upscale merchandise.
A new bridge being constructed, alleged to be done by November, which I doubt, to aid in bringing more tourists onto the island behind the big barrier island.
Still, the place holds a spot in our hearts that time cannot remove. We were fortunate to have our children and one grandchild accompany us. They, too, recall our infrequent sojourns to that outpost of civilization. A swirling beacon from the lighthouse on a sandy mound still warns mariners of impending danger.
Our past visits are marked, at least in their minds, by those distant times when we saw ponies here or there, when we were almost run down by galloping ponies driven by mounted firefighters driving the herd, when the wind was too much to face biking around the loop.
Our house there overlooked a big bay, which faced the east. An early riser, I had the distinct pleasure of being awakened by honking geese whose message, it seemed, was “Get up, the sun is about to rise.”
There they swam in mid-canal, in pairs, as if watching the darkness depart, lightened by that big ball of light, which, by the way, shone only on May 16.
It rose over a huge sand bar. As time passed, and the day grew warmer, the tide gently hid that bar.
In such Eastern Shore towns, life is governed by the ebb and flow of the tides more than by clocks and appointment books. The slower pace of life there is being endangered by the influx of folks, like us. However, unlike some tourists, who visit a place and expect the locals to cater to them, we enjoy the easier pace of life as they live it.
Evenings are for families, or so it seems. “They rolled up the sidewalks,” declared my wife as we returned to our place after dinner. Yes, they had, in fact, closed most of the shops and gone home. What is wrong with that?
It was charming to be greeted by a smiling lady with a distinct Virginian accent as we entered her shop.
One waitress seemed as if we were family. She enamored us, as if it was her distinct pleasure to bring us our meals. Yes, the food was good, but the service made up for some of the shortcomings from the kitchen. How often could that be said of places elsewhere?
It is good being an occasional tourist, since it shows us what others want when they visit Cape May County. Having been a stranger in a quaint land makes one more sensitive to what those who visit here may desire.
Aside from developed and natural barrier islands, I wondered what was the chief difference between our brief getaway and home?
Could it have been that that southern place has changed, but ever so slowly, while we seem to change with every movement of the tides?
Could it be that people go there to enjoy the more relaxed pace and here, they seem to arrive with pent up anger, and let it simmer as they stay?
Have people lost the keen ability to really and truly “go on vacation,” regardless its length? Have they forgotten what it is like to go to a distant place, and simply enjoy their new, temporary surroundings?
Invigorated by our brief escape, we are more ready for the crowds of July and August, realizing they bring with them the lifeblood of this area.
Oh, that we all could drink in the joy of what nature still offers here as well as there. The sun still comes up, and the ducks and geese still seem to rejoice in it, but we are too busy to listen.
The tides rise and fall twice in 24 hours, but our lives are far removed from them and what they bring to the surrounding wetlands.
Or could it be that the people with whom we spend our brief getaways are the real treasure that makes a weekend or two-week vacation special in so many ways?