“Even if you are not going to live there, even if you aren’t going to return, you have that zero-latitude, zero-longitude from which to understand the world.”
About René
I grew up on a little spit of sand in Southern California back when Disneyland was still on the drawing boards and there were no freeways. My front yard was surf and an infinite horizon, the back yard was a vast expanse of salt water marsh. Pacific Coast Highway had just a few cars, and the Santa Fe freight train rumbled past every day. We lived in a tiny beach front bungalow perched on spindly pilings driven into the sand, with the vibration of every breaking wave resonating through the floor. Day and night, the ocean was ever present - the sounds and smells, the salty wind, the changing colors of the water. The mudflat at minus tide was the center of my universe, the tide table my calendar.
My life there didn’t contain the picture of an idyllic sunny beach covered with umbrellas. In the stormy seasons, the closeness of the ocean filled us with constant uncertainty. One night as we slept, the bedroom floor partially washed out during an especially high winter tide. A neighbor came over the next day and put plywood over the gaping hole where the bed had been. There was an inherent wildness to that environment that over the years formed my true education and my interest in all things marine.
My little house was torn down a long time ago and that area is now unrecognizable to me. It’s choked with traffic and pricey stucco boxes, the marsh land is filled with concrete and private marinas. Even though I’ll never return, everything from decades ago has been imprinted, coloring my work and influencing many facets of my life. These days I live in the outerlands of Northern California about five miles from a rocky coastline, at the edge of what was once an old growth redwood forest. After winter storms, the ocean roars with white noise in the distance. A homing signal.
In my wanderings, I’m always pulled to the narrow boundary between sea and land, collecting outcasts from both worlds.
Everything rusts in the salt air. I try to keep it from rusting me.
