Yarmouth And Dennis And Russians, Oh My

Mayflower Beach, Dennis, Cape Cod, Massachusetts

I was on the Cape Cod Playa Saturday night. 
 
But first, Burning Man, 2019 with my daughter, Teagan.  I remember getting there and lying on the sand. This was the rite of passage moment for the first burn experience. To lie on the sand before entering the playa. I lay down and I dropped in.
 
This was exactly where I was and where I was, was exactly where I was supposed to be in that moment in that week with my daughter. 
 
It was amazing.  
 
So Cape Cod.
 
Yesterday, we were on Mayflower Beach, in Dennis, Cape Cod. This was the end of the day, of a day that was quite beautiful. 
 
We were on Mayflower Beach to catch the sunset. The clouds were in, in that way that diffuses the light so the rays of pink that mark the end of the beach day were nowhere to be seen. But still.
 
We walk the sand flats. The tidal markings hold ridges beneath our feet as we head to a distant point out in what is the ocean during the hide tide, to a party of sorts with the sound of music steeped in bass.
 
It feels like I am on the Playa. A Cape Cod Playa with music in the distant, a party of sorts, and sand as far as we can see. 
 
When you are on the Burning Man Playa, in the distant, with the heat the way it is and the light the way it is, there is this twinkling that looks like water. The mirage of the desert in the distance that is really just the dance of heat and light against the white of sand.
 
On this, the low tide, Cape Cod Playa, the water though real, is far enough out that sand is what we first see.
 
We walked, more than half an hour, to this distant party. At one point, because the tide, now turned, is heading back in from the sea, the ocean reaches up our legs. I hold my skirt high in my hand.
 
We reach this party of sorts that is a reunion.  A Russian Reunion. How cool is this.  A 25-year Russian reunion. Turns out that this group of people, now 25 years later so with kids in tow and new partners and spouses and friends pulled along, have been coming here to meet. Every year. At Mayflower Beach. At sunset. For 25 years. A Cape Cod Burning Man Playa Russian reunion. 
 
There is music and one woman plays an electric violin. And the sun, hidden behind those clouds, sets without the pink of dusk we hope to see on our excursion to this beach.
 
The sun sets and the tide rises and, in mass, this Russian Playa Party Reunion turns their back to the incoming water and we all make our way back to the beach that stands above the high tide mark.
 
This is the end of our day.
 
The beginning of our day is in Yarmouth. At Dave’s home. Our Chief Marketing Officer for GenRocket, my husband’s company. 
 
We are here for the day, to spend the day at this lovely home that lives along a salt marsh sky. The day is warm, the air moist with that summer humidity as we sit on the deck and eat fruit and shrimp.
 
Then a long kayak excursion through the salt march streams, in boats with battery charged motors that push us along though the tide has turned and the current often pushes us against the mud and reeds that frame the waterways along the way. This makes us laugh. 
 
The depth is not deep and we look for the surface chaos that warns us of the bars of sand that hoped to snag our motors for just a moment. 
 
And, once back on land and because the tide is now low, we walk across the deeper ocean floor, now shallow, to the sand bar before heading back home for a take-out seafood dinner from The Marshside. Swordfish and Haddock and a Lobster Risotto. And Pepper Potatoes, Calamari, and a Beet Salad with Blue Cheese.
 
I eat a ton of Tootsie Rolls that Dave has on the kitchen counter because, how can I not, and we talk about souls and spirits and loss and grief. And we talk about guilt and love. And how do we understand the purpose of it all if there is no one way to understand the purpose of it all.
 
It is a sweet night after a sweet day. Steeped in gratitude. Anchored by appreciation. Easeful and love filled. Oh, and I ate one orange Starburst, too. I love the orange ones best.

Scenes from the Mayflower Playa

Me and Dave on the Mayflower Playa

View from Dave's porch, the sand bar, the Salt Marsh