Letters

Once upon a time in paradise:

Montauk, Long Island, circa 1960s, staying at the Driftwood on the Ocean (currently known as Driftwood Resort).

In the morning we open our eyes to the sound of surf crashing on the shore, jalousie windows left ajar overnight, letting in fresh salty air and the sound of seagulls singing.

Our parents get the bedroom, my brother and I share the living room.

Rising early to eat a beachy breakfast of eggs or cold cereal, then anticipate the wooden plank walkway clankety-clank-clanking underfoot, delivering us to the sand and sea, a short distance from our room on the ocean.

Brother and I climb the dunes, stand at the top, scanning the land below like pirates perched in a crow’s nest, holding a looking glass up there among the dune grasses, hidden from view, thinking no one knows we are there.

After dinner, Mother and I walk the peaceful beach, hunting for sand dollars, waves crashing as we go along, ebbing and flowing up and down the shore, as far as the eyes can see, leaving fizzy foam in its wake, hissing as it subsides to quiet.

Leaving the setting sun behind us, we head back to rejoin my father and brother in the cozy beachside room.

My brother may play his guitar on this warm summer night. We might watch TV or light “punks” we bought at The Corner Store, swishing them back and forth in the darkness, making designs with the fiery orange tips against the black night sky.

Ellen Fass Greenspan

Bayshore