Galveston

The drive from Austin to Galveston is four hours and simple. It is pavement, yellowy-green grass and billboards. Takes you through the massive city of Houston and small towns you pass through before you realize you were in them. It is 71 east to I-10 east to I-45 South. Cattle and horses in fields by the side of the road, cars sprinkled beside, behind and in front, and the highway stretched out as far as you can see. The drive back is less exciting. No beach to look forward to, the destination already familiar. I made that drive today, and am glad it is, as they say, in the rearview mirror [a fairly good pun].

Galveston is a city that still bears the scars of Hurricane Ike. Houses on the beach have boards where windows should be. Businesses are the same way. One brick building on a main street has "Water Line" etched on its wall. About twelve feet high. The Gulf of Mexico provides the water for all of the beaches in Galveston, and it is the same color as the sand. The most popular street is called Seawall Boulevard. Soaked with hotels, restaurants, bike rentals. The hotel we all stayed in was on it. Last night, my last in Galveston, I crossed Seawall Boulevard, walked two hundred yards and sat on a rock looking out at the gulf. This is what I wrote:

"Darkness. Water the same color as the sky. For all I can see, they both go on forever. Lights across the water. Possibly oil rigs. Maybe boats. But definitely lights. And definitely lower on the sky than the stars. The planes look like blinking comets. Waves coming and going. Appearing suddenly like a white fuse as they burn across the water, then extinguishing and rolling onto the sand, erasing all the castles and messages and hearts. Blank canvas for tomorrow. A few gulls call. Why aren't they sleeping? Sand the same color as dirt, water, stretches out for miles either direction of me. All day, people leave this beach and take part of it with them. In their hair, bags, clothes, towels. Doesn't even make a dent. I can't help but wish there was no road behind me. No Best Western and no street lights. And no McDonalds "M" towering over Kuta Beach. Just rocks and sand and water."

That's it. More later.