Have you been fortunate enough to discover the perfect vacation destination, and enjoy both the place and the experience year after year? We escaped the summer heat of Southwest Florida for the past thirteen years, arriving at the tip of Cape Cod to luxuriate on the deck of our rental home for the week, and bask in the unmistakable beauty of this other world. During the next few weeks, I will be sharing stories written on vacation in Provincetown, while sitting on the rustic wooden deck, coffee in hand, with nothing to do but capture the experience on the page. Provincetown is the oldest thriving artist and writer’s colony in the United States. I invite you to journey with me to the Province lands, the distant Cape, with all of her beauty, mystery, and creativity. It’s like nowhere else.

EARLY MORNING LIGHT

The brilliance of the early morning light as it burns white against the bows of vessels in Provincetown harbor is special light indeed, the suns rays casting their glance across the water and everything fortunate enough to be in its path.  This place, at the end of the line, the eastern most land mass, the tip of the Cape, the Province lands, is know to purveyors of water color, oil, acrylic and all visual mediums as a destination where the sun and moon, and quite possibly all origins of light, both within and without, cast the most fascinating light.

Just now, the morning sun about which we speak has chosen to ascend from behind the horizon, and peak its radiant face above the next-door cottage, bathing me in the warmest glow.  This is delicious, bright and inviting, energizing, simply beautiful.  Rising extra early this morning to greet a new day, already our fifth day of vacation, I wanted to capture the special morning light, the entire harbor basking in the sun’s glory with reflective splendor.  My partner is an aspiring painter, and has commented about the whiteness of the light in the harbor.  Well dear, I’m the one who crawled out of the cocoon like warmth of our bed, with its fresh, crisp sheets and fluffy soft fleece blanket, having snuggled through a chilly Cape Cod night, to experience the whitest of light at 5:45 am.  Camera at the ready, I captured several photos of the harbor, resplendent with wooden sailboats, and propelled vessels, both mechanical and human powered.  No longer able to contain my newfound enthusiasm for this morning light, I slinked back into the bedroom to remind the sleeping princess that the sun rises in the morning, not at lunchtime.  The emanating guttural grunt, akin to a hibernating black bear, signaled that I could take my morning light and put it where the sun don’t shine.  Ouch.  The sacrifices I make for art.

I shall write about my early morning date with the white sunlight so that all who care to partake can experience this beauty, this fleeting moment.  For all too soon the sun will transform its glow into a searing, penetrating heat, good for turning skin into varying colors of caramel, and mocha, and for those genetic unfortunates, lobster red.  I’ll finish my coffee on the deck with the harbor view, and finish my story about the white, white light of a Provincetown morning.