How awful it is to have to hold a collective breath this week as our children, and grandchildren, begin a new school year. How unnerving that gun violence has caused us to doubt the lyrics that our “country ’tis of thee” is still a “sweet land of liberty.”
There was scarcely anyone else around when I fell asleep on the ocean beach late Labor Day afternoon. I had left my pickup truck in the parking lot and walked to the west to look for whales and meditate a bit. The town lifeguards, with no one to keep and eye on, lazed around under a plastic shelter and took turns in the stand, looking out at nothing much at all. Two people and a dog were in the distance.
Just when I thought I had seen every last obscenity the 2019 Hamptons summer scene had to offer, things took a turn for the strange. On an afternoon walk down Job’s Lane in Southampton on a recent afternoon, I was greeted by a number of “keep out” and “no trespassing” signs as I approached my favorite people-watching spot.
Labor Day weekend is always bittersweet.
