Pacific Grave

I saw fog tip-toeing in past the windows at work last night, silently, furtively looking for a town to sit on. It found Pacific Grove and intends to stay. It means the heat is over with for a while and that nothing will dry out. Towels will mold and hang limp on their racks. Shoes will mildew in closets and I will get out my winter clothes again. You have to wear layers, many layers, definitely layers. There are microclimates around town including what some call "banana belts." Any bananas that struggle to maturity in those areas - and I doubt there are any - will surely be snatched by raccoons though. The coons live in the storm drains as well as in trees and various places where people leave pet food out for Fluffy.

Raccoons have experienced population explosions at times. You would see large gangs of them strolling down streets at night smoking cigarettes and keying cars, screeching at each other and rumbling with other gangs. A lady interviewed in a local paper years ago stated that she heard a din outside at night, went out and saw several coons up on her rooftop. She ran inside to find something to shoo them away and came up with an armload of apples. Using her best softball pitch and yelling Pacific Grove insults ("Go away, you horrible things!"), she unleashed a rain of terror on the raccoons up there. Well, anyway, it was a few apples whizzing in their general direction. To her amazement, they caught the apples and threw them right back again.

The fog is back, at least in Pacific Grove, Carmel and lower Carmel Valley. Monterey is on the leeward side of the ridge of hills that separate it from Pebble Beach and PG. Around here, fog is animate and makes its presence known and felt, almost always. "Ugh, here comes the fog," you might hear. Or, "It's sunny now, but the fog will be here later." Like an unwanted relative who comes over and sleeps on the couch snoring loudly. Farting those silent but deadly farts. The fog changes everything: The temperature, the day, your mood. With the sun out, you're optimistic, busy, happy. When it disappears into a fog bank and the sky dims, you snarl, your hopes fade and your feet stink. You even gain weight. You want to join the mobs of coons out stealing pet food and keying cars. Nothing is fluffy about Fluffy. The dog gets moldy. You can't tell what time of day it is, either. It's always about 2 o'clock in the afternoon and you need a nap, all day long.

I've lived in Southern California where the summer temperature got to triple digit hot, fry-eggs-on-the-sidewalk hot. I put clothes out to dry on the line (being the sentimental June Cleaver that I am) and could take the first ones down right after the last were hung. Stiff with the heat and dry, crispy dry.

In our town, now feeling like Pacific Grave, you cheer yourself up with memories of heat, playing in broken fire hydrant fountains, peeling burned skin off your nose by the side of sparkling blue pools. You cheer yourself up with memories of anything warm at all, anything dry and free of mold.

One summer when I was lifeguarding in Monterey, I counted five entire days when it was sunny all day long. Monterey fares better than PG, but the fact is the hotter it is everywhere else, the colder and more damp and dark it will be in Pacific Grave. It can be romantic I guess (I am an optimistic and hopeful June Cleaver, too) since the cold damp encourages snuggling by warm fires, sipping warm drinks after a brisk walk at the shore. Pacific Grove was named most romantic town in America a couple of years ago, and you can be sure the voters encountered mysterious and lovely fog, cute sea otters (hired by PG Chamber of Commerce), and were staying in a picturesque bed and breakfast.

So, we who live in the Grave reminisce about summer's warmth in the days of our youth. We clean seagull shit off our cars, pull in our pet food at night and keep a good supply of Clorox on hand for the mildew. Because on the rare warm day when the sun shines we know we can practically see to foreign shores across the Big Blue right outside our windows, and it's then when we feel most like we are in a specific groove.