March 2011

Dear old friends are planning a visit to California and asked if I’d let them know the best sites to take in during their trip.  Although I could certainly bring to mind my favorite things to do in the area, my mind blanked when I tried to summon a list of items that tourists would find interesting and “must-see” parts of their vacation.  I turned to the Internet for some support.

In addition to realizing there are many more wonderful attractions in this area than I’ve taken advantage of, I glimpsed an article that caught my attention.  This particular article on Southern California travel was reported to cover little-known facts about the region.  The article asserted that despite how lovely our beaches and sunsets are in the summer–the time when everyone expects them to be lovely–that the far better and more beautiful time to enjoy our beaches and sunsets is in the winter.  At that time, the article claimed, the beaches and sunsets were filled with unparalleled beauty.  I wondered aloud if that were true, as I speculated that perhaps the writers of the article had professed that for the benefits of their advertisers’ vacation rentals business, but then I decided to give the writers the benefit of the doubt, give up my cynicism and see for myself.

After a meeting at the office, I announced that I was going to take a couple of hours off and go for a drive.  Alone, I drove down to the beach, grabbed a dog-hair-covered sweatshirt out of the back of the car and walked toward the shoreline.  As I was leaving the beach parking lot, I caught the most unusual site: a spindly sprig of a plant had grown up through the center of the pole supporting a parking sign and sprouted out the other end.  It was just an ordinary plant, but it was hearty enough to grow through the inside of a pole to nearly seven feet in height.  The plant burst through the top of the pole bringing unexpected beauty with it.

The beach and sunset were truly magnificent, made even better by the fact that virtually no one else was there to witness them…not bad for a random Tuesday night in February.  Perhaps, I thought, the writers of the article were right; unexpected beauty is often times the most special.

Wishing you unexpected beauty–

 

Joel J. Loquvam

Attorney At Law