Day 38—Storm Watch

Sabrina's little makeshift bed on the nightstand

blogging.

Last night went okay. At about 4:30 AM, Sabrina woke up for a feeding, and since we’re in a one-room cabin, the light and noise woke Edgar up, too. So, we had some baby-juggling and comforting to do before everyone finally settled down. I was pretty tired, and was probably not the most patient dad to either of the two, who both wanted Mom at the same time, so I had to take the unlucky one at any given time.

We woke up this morning, got ready, and traipsed next door to my parents’ cabin. There, we had pancakes for breakfast. We attempted to heat the syrup in the in-room mini coffee maker, but that just resulted in lukewarm, strong-coffee-tasting sludge. Lesson learned.

The view from our cabin

It was pretty rainy, so we didn’t venture much outside, but with a view like this one, we didn’t need to do much. The morning’s high tide combined with spring rain and runoff had the creek brim-full. The tide wasn’t the highest or most violent that we’ve seen it, but the tide table says that we’re in for higher tides later this week.

Edgar got bored, so dad and I took him for a walk. We walked down to Kalaloch Campground and back—a much easier walk than a beach walk for my dad who doesn’t do so good climbing over driftwood anymore. It was pouring rain, as is usual for this time of year. Edgar was afraid of the rain at first, and flat out refused to walk on his own, so I carried him on my shoulders and soon he was dripping wet and singing a little happy song as we went along.

Dripping after the walk.

What a little man!

After lunch, we came back to our cabin. I put Edgar down for his nap, and went outside to watch the rain and waves and read a book. I don’t know how long I stayed out there, but eventually I got cold and came back inside to find Jen standing in the bathroom, bouncing Sabrina, and attempting to read her book off the bathroom counter. Apparently, Sabrina was only happy being held and Jen was afraid of waking Edgar up. I took Sabrina and let Jen nap (As I had no real intention of napping today). Shortly thereafter, Edgar woke up (too early) from his nap, so Jen and Edgar cuddled on the bed while I held Sabrina on the couch, watched the ocean, and read my book. I dozed a little, too. Sabrina started making noise, so I bundled her up and went next door to see what the folks were doing.

They had just woken up from their nap, and as we started talking, a loud, long peal of thunder shook the cabin. I peeked out the window to see flashes of lightning to the southwest over the ocean. Our cabin provides a great northwest view, but not so great towards the south. I convinced my parents to take a little walk to go look at the storm. I said “I think we have a little window of time when we can watch the storm roll in before it hits us.” So, we bundled up. I wrapped Sabrina up papoose-style, with her in the baby bjorn under my coat. We walked the 100 feet or so to the gazebo looking out over the ocean to the southwest. As we got to the edge of the cliff, a huge gust of wind came up, taking our breath away. At that moment, the storm broke. We were practically blown back to our cabin, with hail pelting our backs. Thankfully, Sabrina was well-protected and sleeping. With flashes of lightning and loud thunder, we made it back inside, rain-soaked on the back of our jeans, but not on the front. It was fun to see the power of nature up close, and I’m glad we had some pretty substantial shelter to retreat back into.

The rest of the afternoon was spent playing cards with the parents, switching off Sabrina and Edgar duties. Jen and I exchanged valentines… sort of. Jen was going to buy me a book from the gift shop. They usually have fascinating books there. Today, apparently, their selection had dwindled, so I got a book-IOU. I got Jen some Will Oldham CDs and some chocolate.

The squall this afternoon did something else strange to the weather: It created a narrow strip along the coast of clear, blue sky. This gave us about 5 minutes of late-afternoon sunshine, which bathed the world in a beautiful, almost-too-bright prismatic quality before disappearing again behind the next bank of clouds.

At twilight, I took Edgar for a walk down to the beach. I took a bunch of pictures (looking for possible album art), but Edgar wasn’t too interested in playing in the sand or the logs. He just wanted to be carried home. Oh well. Sometimes it’s beautiful here, and we play in the sand and water, and sometimes it’s beautiful here and we stay indoors and look out at it. Either way, it’s fantastic. 

Dinner was steak, in the cabin.  After dinner, Edgar and I walked to the store (about 50 yards away) and picked up some ice cream for our bread pudding dessert. Then, after getting dad and grandma to read him books, Edgar went to bed. I cuddled Sabrina and kept a pacifier in her mouth. We played a few more rounds of pinochle, and now it’s time to retire.