When I was a kid back in the 1980’s my Grandparents generation of middle-class folks would rent a home on the Jersey Shore for a few weeks each summer. We lived close enough to make the dive in a few hours. Going there felt so different from home. We had friends who owned a small bungalow. Other more distant cousins would come. The kids would all sleep in old brass beds on a sandy wooden floor upstairs among stacks of well-read beach trash paperbacks. We would watch Godzilla movies between going to Skipper Dipper for ice cream cones, and the beach for sunburns. We smelled like sunscreen and citronella candles. There was a rusty garage full of bikes and surfboards, a hammock and picnic bench under a scrub pine. It was wonderful.
All of the people of that generation are dead and buried. The house has been sold, torn down, and replaced with a much larger home. The distant cousins are more distant.
I live in Brooklyn now. We spend most of the summer here in the City. Governor's Island, Coney Island, Central Park, etc... I take my kids out to Fire Island each summer. We rent an old cabin with no television that’s within walking distance to the beach. It has six small bedrooms so we invite friends to join us. I cook and there is an outdoor shower. It's perfect .
I found a recipe for Clam Chowder in a very old book in the kitchen of the beach house. It was published here on the island and has two versions of the soup: one to be cooked on the beach over a campfire; the other a stovetop version. I have my fishing licenses and would be able to light a beach fire, but I’m not sure how the constable would actually respond to that.
We bring our fishing poles to the beach and cast into the ocean hoping for some late summer fluke with spoons, spinners, shrimp and squid lures. I don’t see any of the other people fishing with a campfire. Afterwards we go to the market to get clams for dinner.
The quahog clams I get are large and full. Gray outer shells with pure white interiors and a big bright purple spot, their flesh is a light golden yellow. To open them and get their flesh I steam them until they release, just a few minutes to keep them tender. Quiet stubborn clams hiding complicated relationships. Uncomplicated animals. One of my friends is allergic, a clam could kill her. I pry open each of the steamed clams to reveal their soft interior flesh.
There are sixteen friends and family gathered here tonight at this long table at the beach house. I made a huge pot of pasta with clams and broil the fluke. The house smells like the ocean was boiled with garlic. Broad yellow semolina linguine has soaked up the white velvety sauce and in it are nestled white pearls of garlic, golden bits of clams, green flecks of fresh parsley, and black specks of peppercorn. We eat all of the pasta, fish, salad, and garlic bread.
After dinner we go to Beaches and Cream to get Dole Whip for dessert. The frozen whipped fruit melts in the heat. A drip of sweet pineapple juice runs down my arm.
In the morning it’s very quiet; bugs and birds. Chirping and whistling. Neighbors starting their morning. Cicadas in the trees. My son rouses me from my early morning nap.
It’s raining hard. A large storm has hit the island. We’re trapped together in this house while it rages outside. It calms a bit and I go for a walk in the drizzling rain. I don’t have an umbrella. I walk over to the market in Ocean Beach. Everything is closed. It’s a Tuesady. The season is over. We should have left yesterday. I walk to the Seaview Market in the next town over, they should still be open. I’m the only person here.
I take the kids down to the water so we can see the erosion on the beach. The waves cut deep channels in the beach creating tidal pools with sand cliff embankments about two feet deep. The storm is off the coast, we can see the thunderclouds moving swiftly along the horizon. The sky is a million different colors of gray.
