halcyon summertine

I remember when I was about 13 spending a week in a cottage at the State Park at Myrtle Beach with my family .

Family vacation… In the summertime… Sea breezes, lemonade, and watermelon…

It was kind of a strange disenfranchised place but my brother and I loved it! The cottages did not have A/C (hey, this was the early 60’s ) and were about ¼ mile from the beach across the dunes and saw grass.

It was so very quiet all of the time with one notable exception.

The location of the State Park was on the ocean side of a coastal highway directly across from the local US Air Force Base. This was inconsequential most of the time, however, at 4 AM the jets would take off in pairs to the east (over the Park’s cottages) and they hit the afterburners and broke the sound barrier directly overhead.

The boom rattled everything down to the fillings in your teeth. YOU WOKE UP ! And just as you started to doze again, here came two more . BOOM BOOM BOOM.

Everyday we were up to watch the sun rise! It was glorious.