I am sitting at a table in a small restaurant in Provincetown, Massachusetts.  Cuban Jazz, like something from the 1950’s is playing over the sound system. I have a cup of coffee to one side and they seem content to let me write, since there are only half a dozen people in the room.

I have never been to Cape Cod before. Seven years in New England, and I’ve never been to the cape. True, it’s been a busy seven years, and particularly in the last couple, there’s been enough drama in my life to fill a couple of soap operas. But still….

This is one of those rare times when the stars came together. My son is away on a field trip for a few days. I could find coverage at the church. I had a little extra money. So I ran away from home, found a cheap room at the tip of the cape, and took off.

The roads were pretty clear. Even the dreaded 495 around Boston was fairly free of traffic, and by mid day or so, I was crossing over to the cape.

The truth is, I know very little about Cape Cod. I have this mental image of Hyannis that lingers from being a child in the Kennedy era. I know there are lots of little fishing villages on the edges. Or at least they used to be fishing villages. Today they are more tourist villages with a few fishing boats still working the waters.  And in the villages, there are lots of little shops and restaurants.

The woman I love adores the cape. And she suggested a few places to go. She in fact, suggested Provincetown, or Ptown as the locals call it. It’s an old seaporty kind of town full of guest homes, bed and breakfasts, all kinds of shops, and lots of restaurants.

Of course, most of them are closed. This is the very off season on the cape.

Which is just as well. I am looking for quiet, not night life. My life has been too busy as of late. Busy and full of good things mostly, but still too busy. I function best when I have some down time, serious down time to let life sink in.

Something is not right with me these days. Not physically. But in some other way that I can’t quite define. I am getting things done. I am creating. I have time for the spiritual disciplines that bring me peace. But something has not been right.

I suppose I could have sat at home and pondered, but when you work at home and live at home and play at home, sometimes that is not best place to delve into yourself. There are interruptions. Distractions. Housework  calls you. The cat jumps in your lap demanding attention. Sometimes we need a change of scenery, something new to jar our stale old brains and move us forward. A place without interruptions.

And so, away I went.

About one, I got to a little town called Chatham. A lady at the gas station told me that it was the most ‘together” town on the cape. I had no idea what “togethe” meant, but she was effusive.

It WAS cute enough, even with most everything closed, but as I drove down Main Street, I could see a long stretch of sand and I kept driving.

That’s it in the picture above. I parked my car and began walking. I could see it went out to a point and that at the end of the point there were waves, thin white lines, moving to the shore. It was a good ways, a mile and a half maybe, two miles maybe.

I walked. When I began, I could hear the sounds of the town. Cars. Kids playing basketball somewhere. In the distance, I heard a pile driver methodically dropping weight on pylons, driving them deep into the sand with a slow, deep “Clunk. Clunk. Clunk.” Each one about a minute apart. There were half a dozen sets of footprints on the beach.

But as I walked. the city sounds faded away. All I could hear was the wind, and the waves. As I reached the tip of the land. one by one, the sets of footprints turned back until there were no footprints at all. As I walked around the last spit of land, suddenly I was alone. IT was me, and the sand and the sea.

It was cold. And a little windy. But I had dressed for it. Thick flannel lined jeans. A couple of layers of flannel. An ancient down vest, stocking cap and gloves. Comfortable, I sat on a small sand dune that blocked the wind.

I sat. Probably for the better part of two hours. I didn’t think. I just sat. I felt the sun. I stared out across the sand bars. I breathed. In time, I could hear my heart beating, slowing down. It was almost as if I didn’t exist. I just was.

For a guy who some mornings struggles to meditate for 20 minutes without his monkey mind zooming in a hundred directions, it was pretty amazing. There were no great revelations, no singing choirs or answers rising from the sea. There was just being, and it was pretty nice.

But of course, we never get to stay in those moments. The sun was going down. So I drove to the end of the cape to watch it sink into the sea. The cape does this weird twisty thing, so at the end, you are actually facing west, and get to see the sunset, even though you are poking into the Atlantic. It will take a day or two to get my sense of direction back.

I parked and crossed over the dunes to the beach I walked west, with the Atlantic on my right. Again, not a soul on the beach. Peaceful? Beyond peaceful. The kind of peace you don’t find very often any more.

I thought about the tide as it slowly came in. I thought about the woman I love. I thoughts about the smell of the air, salty and clean. I thought about the stones on the beach, polished and smooth. Slowly, the sun fell. It grew dark. I turned back and drove into Ptown to find my room and a place to eat.

Virtually everything was closed. It was like a ghost town. I walked block after block and didn’t see anyone. It was strange – all these shops and bars and eateries,  and no people. Finally I found this place. It looked closed, but there were two torches outside the door and Cuban jazz playing, so I went in.

The food was good. The people were friendly. There was a camaraderie, sort of a “Everyone else has left but us. We are the survivors.” feel to the place. Just by being there, when almost no one else was, made me somehow one of them. They drew me into conversation. I heard life stories, heartbreaks, losses, struggle. I heard about trips taken and families lost. I heard about betrayal and love and… life.

One by one, people left. I will have to leave too. The place closes at 10 and right now it’s me and the waiters and the bartender. I can hear the chef cleaning up in the kitchen. I will pack up my ipad and walk home on the empty streets.

I have no real idea what I came here for. To rest? To heal? To ponder? To write? I m nor sure. But I am here, and it feels good. It is a lonely place and I am alone.

But not lonely.

Be well. Travel wisely.

Tom