I love walking out onto my balcony on a sunny, summer Sunday morning with coffee in hand and smelling the fresh sea air wafting over from Puget Sound. It is the scent of home for me. Even though I spent my first fifteen years land locked in upstate New York (think Woodstock, Yasgur's farm and Catskill Mountains) for me, the smell of the salt water brings on nostalgia. Maybe it was the summers vacationing on the Atlantic Ocean in Maine, New Hampshire, The Jersey Shore and the Carolina's.
After a year living in beautiful, vibrant, architecturally interesting Prague, I moved to Greece for a summer job in 2003. As I stepped off the plane onto the tarmac on Skiathos Island, I sniffed the air, wrinkled my nose a bit and thought "What is that smell?" Then I brighted as I realized it was the sea. That's what I'd been missing living in The Czech Republic. Without realizing it I had missed the sea, salt water, the salty sea air, seagulls, the stench of kelp drying up on the beach. I knew I was home, at least for the summer.
I'm drawn to places that are surrounded by or at least very near salt water. After Greece, I lived in Lisbon, Portugal for two winters surrounded by water and just minutes from the Atlantic Ocean. My next work/living destination was the west coast of Turkey on the Aegean Sea. When my job finished, I embarked on a solo tour for a month or so and traveled along the coast down to the Mediterranean Sea, up the center of the country to the Black Sea and finally to Istanbul and the Sea of Marmara. Just as the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans differ, no two seas are alike, yet all are spectacular in their own unique way.
While researching places to live in the U.S. upon my return to Seattle in 2006, I've focused on coastal cities and towns, as well as islands that sounded promising. Several places have been appealing, but something always keeps me here in Seattle.
Summer has finally hit the Pacific Northwest this year. The delay was long, but August has been warm, sunny and full of the summer activities I enjoy like boating, outdoor concerts, golfing, motorcycle riding, walks along our Pacific Northwest beaches, picnics and cocktails on the deck with friends overlooking the glorious Puget Sound. It's during these brief moments in Seattle I forget anywhere else in the world exists.
I am home (at least until November).
