The view under the pier

Standing firm
Deerfield Beach, FL
February 2023
This photo originally shared on Instagram

Whenever we come here, I like to stand in this very spot under the pier for what seems like an inordinately long time.

I’ll quietly watch the waves roll in and crash into the footings. Again and again, an endlessly shifting kaleidoscope of water, spray, color, light, and energy.

I’ll think about what it took to build a structure capable of withstanding the relentless power of the ocean. Wave after wave. Day after day. Year after year.

I’ll also think about the people who built this pier, a strip of territory in a place where such things probably shouldn’t exist.

Yet this one does. This backdrop to so many moments in my family’s history, in photos of our kids as they played in the sand, unaware of the turbulence playing out around them. This constant, comforting beacon to us as we visited this resonant place on too many vacations to count.

Too many by one estimate. Not enough by every other.

Today, it’s just me in the shadows. The waves glow a shade of green I’ve never seen before. A sign, perhaps, that you can return to the places that shaped you, but the story always has new chapters to be written.

So we stand in the shadows in the places that once meant - and still mean - something to us, and hope we’re taking enough time to let their ever-evolving message sink in.

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