We are where we are

The story of Irish Beach is a long one, full of beauty, great people and well, the absurd. The cast of characters includes myself, naturally, all the family and siblings, deceased parents, dear friends, and outside forces represented by the Planning Department, the Concerned Citizens, and my pals the topo, environmental, and septic engineers.

In 2000, my husband and I returned from two years of cruising on our sailboat, Joyride, to find that the family enterprise at Irish Beach, (my father developed the Acquistapace sheep ranch for second homes back in 1964), was complicated by intrafamily disputes. Alas, the family had fallen into the trap of so many others where there are siblings, property and competing interests. It continues to be fraught. My purpose in writing the chronicles is to hopefully amuse. I want to be funny, and I want to create interest in our little part of the world. Despite the beauty of Irish Beach, there have been a few detractions. But with a sense of humor, the negative is substantially diminished, and hopefully, this accidental real estate developer can tell a reasonably good story. Since I keep a journal of sorts, some writings will be lifted from there, and some will be updates, like a serial, on the latest developments. My goal is that in five years or less, this will all be over, but for now, the saga continues on its merry way.

Entry from Journal, March 11, 2007

I’m on the beach with wine, novel (The Windup Bird Chronicles which I’m enjoying very much), and pen and paper. The ocean has reshaped the beach, and I am sitting on what has become a sand shelf about 6’ above the flat open playa. The shelf has all the driftwood on it, ripe for forts. Where Irish Creek connects to the beach, the stream has carved a new path all the way to the ocean itself, although there are some still ponds to my left. Cirrus clouds above.

Jim is up at the house, resting. He as a bad hernia and spends a percentage of his time pressing it. When he is distracted by any kind of physical development, it’s best to leave him alone. Surgery scheduled soon, his first, so he’s anxious.

I’ve returned from a brief walk down the beach communing with the memory of my father. Perhaps the wine has made me a little maudlin. It’s very beautiful now. The sun is still high and soligment (light rays) settle on the water. (We learned this word when we stayed at a bed and breakfast last summer in Duluth. Swedish I think.) I looked up at the Kraft and Natwick houses on the bluffs directly above me and watched a pickup with perhaps a refrigerator in the back creep toward the Natwick’s. The house looks great. It was a little prefab my father had built to show customers what could be done on a lot at Irish Beach. He has just opened his sales office, little fluorescent colored flags flapping in front. The Natwick lot is singularly spectacular, tucked under the Cypress on the rock above the beach. If you had it for sale now, it would be worth hundreds of thousands, quite a jump from the $2,000 to say $7,000 price range my father was operating in. Did my father grasp the value and grandeur of what he was marketing? And the Kraft house, Dr. Kraft, the doctor waiting for what was left of my father’s body to arrive at the hospital after his plane crash. I think it must have been shattering to bear witness to the remains of a dear and close friend. (I am reminded of our people at war in Iraq when they are faced with the remains of a “buddy” just blown to bit by an IED.) But the Krafts, now in their eighties or thereabouts, have a fine house on one of the most coveted coastal pieces of property imaginable. I am lucky to be here to continue to see it all, and remember its history. It’s a good space to be in, and I hope to remain in it for awhile.