Last weekend, a taste of fall arrived in the form of a sweet long-interval swell. I surfed Saturday night in the kind of beauty that is almost more than the soul can bear. The sunset turned the ocean purple and gold as the nearly full moon ascended and hung over the sand dunes, the perfect backdrop to the foghorn’s repeating bleat. The waves marched in slightly from the west, providing rights, real rights, for the first time in what seems like ever. I cavorted.

Today, the wind whips from the north, brisk and annoying. Instead of surfing, I lie on the futon in a patch of sunshine, grow fat and sleepy in the heat, wait for the wind to turn again.