It is a small cove, no more than a hundred yards across. At low tide, one can walk perhaps fifty paces down a slippery slope of wet rocks to meet the sea, being wary of the fresh flotsam washed ashore. At high tide, you will be lucky to walk five paces before your toes are awash in startling cold.
A small cliff borders the cover, green grass atop it, that gives way to tan and brown rocks as it goes further down. The brown boulders turn to grey globs of a volcano's leftovers, perfectly smooth and speckled from the sea's constant care. As one follows the shoreline down, they go from grey to black, smooth to slippery, cool to cold, and no longer are they the lone inhabitants of the shore line. A crab's crusted shell, a oyster's open, empty home, and innumerate strands of seaweed stuck in between, all subject to the ebb and flow of the waves, destined to appear or disappear in an instant of white spray.
The sound, which can be faintly heard from my father's house, is deafening here. Yes, the waves crash and boom against the sharp slope, but it is not their influx that creates the cacophony. Rather, it is the outflow. As each wave reaches it's limit and begins it's return to the sea, it refuses to leave empty-handed. Hundreds of tiny rocks scramble and scrabble over one another as the water pulls them along, like a great instrument made of a million landslides. (End ten minutes.)
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