View from the porch.. I think I'll stay awhile.
10.10.10... Nothing too scary with that. I don't even hear too many people talking about it. In binary code it is the number 42. Sally Fitzgibbions tweeted that this morning so I thought I would toss it in. For me it marks the one year anniversary of moving to La Conchita. LC as it's called by the locals.
Excerpt from the novel.. The Innocents..
The '66 Bonneville eased out of Rincon Park and turned south, Wil nudged on the pedal conjuring up a throaty exhaust. He still had the hots for the car, virtually stolen from a widow during the gas crunch. The Bonnie had style; it went like a white bat. It's also carried a 9'6"longboard in a partition he'd punched through the back seat. To improve it's handling he'd replaced the suspension and steering. Other than that, the car was mint.
Wil rested his arm on the open window, to his left, La Conchita appealed to some inner sense. It was so unexpected: half a mile long, scrunched against the coastal cliffs, a vest pocket community not even on most road maps. North-bound drivers escaping LA for the red tiled splendors of Santa Barbara another 15 minutes up the road rarely caught two blinks of it in the rearview. Which suited him fine.
Like most locals, he dug the closeness of it. People co-existed.. like the mobile homes, beach shacks, stucco houses, redwood decks. Roses grew next to cactus, fuchsias next to Spanish bayonet. And up the street at the north end, bananas, the fruit tree-ripening in bright blue bags. La Conchita itself hadn't grown much, though. Laid out in 1924, it waited for the movies stars and city folk to come, some made it as far as Mussel Shoals. After a while the coast highway brought others: oil workers, smugglers, retirees, surfers, all attracted by cheap lots, and two miles of sloping beach...
Richard Barre pretty much nailed it in his 1995 description of LC. The banana's are unfortunately gone, and there are probably more nurses than smugglers these days though. It was late '94 when I first took a look at a house for sale on Vista del Rincon. Theresa quickly shut that idea down? The first slide happened about 3 months later when I was at the Ski Industries trade show in Vegas. I clearly remember the watching it on the news along side Chuck Barfoot, snowboard pioneer, and long time LC resident. Well..Chuck on is on the front row and so am I so I think we have more to worry about with the global warming and melting polar ice caps.. lol.
It was Jenny, Julia, and my daughter Kalie who brought me to La Conchita a year ago to this day. Well.. Long story short. That didn't quite pan out. So it was Jenny, Julia, who went back to Santa Barbara, leaving th big house, and mortgage, and myself. Thank you. I found Susy and her daughter to rent the uptairs. Problem solved.Driving home last night on the way back from the Carp just in time to catch the sunset, there was a big ol dolphin show going on. Dolphins stretched from the curve all the way to the middle of town. Jumping, playing, racing, generally flying all over the place, speaking to me once again.. Yes.. I think I will stay awhile..
Bobby.. Some of the biggest LC Beach Break I've seen.
