A Cure for the "Shoulds"

Whenever I start thinking "We should be making plans for what sight to see because we only have one more week (or a couple of days or one afternoon) before we have to leave," I know it's time to take a break.

And when it's time for a break, we head for the nearest body of water to benefit from its relaxing quality.

We had reached the point where the
"shoulds" were beginning to pile up, so off to the nearest body of water--the Pacific Ocean.

We headed south on I-5 to Imperial City around the southern tip of San Diego Bay and headed north on the Silver Strand, a highway with the ocean on the left and the bay on the right.

After a drive of less than 10 miles, we arrived at Coronado with its elegant hotel--the Hotel Del Coronado--and scenic Municipal Beach.

We were fortunate enough to find a parking space along Ocean Boulevard (even though our odds of finding one were pretty good on this fall weekday morning) and even more fortunate to find a bench along the sidewalk adjacent to the beach.

Let the break from the shoulds begin.

Time passed slowly on this sunny day with just a puff of a breeze. As we watched the life of the beach pass before us, we noted the day's activities of rest,

play,

and work appear before us. The sound of the waves washing ashore was fairly faint, but as we focused on those sounds, we were able to dismiss the sounds of traffic just behind us.

When we turned our attention to the sidewalk, we saw joggers, joggers with strollers,

strollers with strollers, and a young woman sitting on the rocks, phone in hand. (The Hotel Del Coronado is in the background. For our visit to the Hotel Del, see the October 1, 2009 entry.)

I saw this truck from the Coronado Brewing Company ap-proaching, but my reflexes were so slowed due to my relaxed state that by the time I had reached for and positioned my camera, I was only able to photograph it after it had passed.

As the morning passed and a big chunk of the afternoon was history, an exchange went something like: "Well, we should be going; it's past lunch time."

"Yup."

Ten minutes later a similar observation and acknowledgement occurred; after a second interval and a third call for lunch, we began our walk back to the truck.

The homes above and left fit the relaxed elegance of the Hotel and beach.

But it was seeing the windows in one of the homes that ended our morning with a bit of humor. We wondered what the figures would look like at night with the light from the interior rooms shining through.