Neighbor J and I trekked to tree-lighting festivities at a coastal port. It was kind of a boring ceremony. Very small-town and mostly for the locals, which we weren’t. But the moment the tree lit up and the fireworks went off was pretty spectacular.
I mentioned coastal port specifically, because that “tree” is no tree at all.
It’s an artful heap of crab traps, aka crab pots. Decorated with floats, one from each boat in the local fleet.
The ceremony may not exactly have been what you’d call impressive (the high school choir that led the caroling — including “Deck the Halls with Lots of Crab Pots” — had all of nine members and was almost inaudible from across the street where the crowd was cordoned). It was quite touching, though. It included tributes to two locals lost at sea. One of them had young children who gathered for photos around an anchor illuminated in his honor. Man, ocean fishing and crabbing has got to be a tough life.
After the big event, J and I walked the strip of little businesses staying open late. We found dogs in the first two we visited — a pair of Sheltie puppies happily playing in their crate in a fiber arts store and an older lab mix greeting bookstore browsers.
Running out of stores to visit, we found a fish market. J bought a fresh Dungeness crab to take home and I got a mixed crab-shrimp cocktail for the road. Mmmmmm.
The evening was calm, clear and not raining. It was lovely to walk along the marina in the dark. But brrrrr, chilly. Good thing J bought herself a fancy car a few months ago; we seriously enjoyed those heated seats on the long drive home.
We got caught up in a parade this weekend in a small town, it looks like everyone came, adults, kids and dogs.
Man do I like small towns but as a kid I hated the one I was raised in because it was boring but the older I get the more boring becomes something that can be appreciated IMHO.