Cape May Diaries
42- End of the Season
I met the old man on the promenade during our third trip to Cape May. I had just finished my morning jog and had settled down to my first cup of coffee from the day.
The old man sat on the end of my bench, not frail exactly, but more expired -- as if he had run a greater distance than I had and for a longer period of time. When he saw me watching him, he diverted his gaze, like someone thinking he was intruding on me.
Thick lines creased his forehead suggesting he had spent a significant amount of time in the sun, like a fisherman or sailor, although his mannerisms seemed too refined for either -- somewhat delicate. His skin struggled to find color, and tended to take on a shade of gray only slightly different in hue from his thinning hair. He looked bleached, and reminded me of a piece of driftwood.
"So," he said with a sigh, "Victorian Week is over."
"Not quite," I said, slightly startled by his speaking to me. "Technically we still have a day left."
He squinted at me, a slight haze dimmed what might have once been sharp blue eyes.
"You're not from around here?" he said.
"No," I said. "I come south once a year."
"For Victorian Week?"
"To repeat our honeymoon. They happen to coincide."
This time the old man's sigh lasted longer and seemed to contain meaning I did not understand. He seemed a degree sadder on my account.
"It's been a long season, this year and business was poor,” he mumbled. “I’ve come to hate this time of year anyway.”
I wanted to ask what business he was in, but I chose not to interrupt.
He stood up -- coffee sloshing in his cup as he moved -- and hobbled closer to me, re-settling nearer to me on the bench, like a bird settling onto a perch.
"Where are you from, boy?" he asked.
"I grew up around Paterson," I said, "though I spent most of my life kicking around different parts of New Jersey."
"Tell me," I asked. "Why do you hate this time of year?"
"I didn't use to," he said. "There was a time early on when my wife and I enjoyed this part of the year. Not so many people came down here back then, with Wildwood and Atlantic City. It was quiet here back then that time of the year, none of this constant tourist chatter."
I asked him if he knew much about the local history. He laughed.
"You don't spend time in this place without learning some of its history," he said. "It's all around you -- even without the constant lectures. It seeps into you without your knowing about it. I didn't know much when I first came with Mary, only that it had some history as an old resort.
"Later, when I learned a little more I used to sit down on the beach near the end of the promenade where new Cape May ends and where the old Cape May once was. Back then, before the great storm, a few houses still stood on stilts. I remember thinking how silly they all look, like stick houses the wind might blow down at any time. I still go down to that end to look, although the state's laid claim to that part of the place given it over to the birds.”
“You must like Cape May if you stayed here so long,” I said.
"Like it? We loved it. Mary and I would walk up and down the boardwalk when it was still made of wood, arm in arm, taking in the sun and the small of the ocean. Have you noticed all the butterflies?"
I nodded.
"Well, they're half the reason we kept coming back," the old man said. "We even started a business here, although back then that was a crazy idea, considering the lack of tourists. Looking back, we probably should have started the business in Wildwood and come down here to live. But we wanted to be part of this community."
"Did you stay here all year?"
The old man shook his head. "Not for many years," he said. "We were still too nervous to trust ourselves living here year round. We summered here like people did a century ago. We wintered up north. Besides, Mary always got depressed this time of year. She liked summer and the chattering kids, even if I didn't. She liked looking out on the beach and seeing it full of people and colored umbrellas. When those things vanished, it was pointless for us to stay."
The old man fell quiet, reached into his pocket for a crumpled tissue. He wiped the corners of his eyes, then blew his nose.
He didn't say when he wife died, only that she had, and he still mourned her as if the death had occurred a few days or weeks earlier.
"After she was gone, I started feeling the same way she had about this time of year, seeing it all as cold and bleak," he said. "I guess I never noticed how empty the place gets once the tourists go. I certainly didn't notice them getting older -- the regular folks who we saw come each year. I kept mistaking sons and grandsons for the men I met when we first started our business down here. They were kind enough, thinking of me as though I had complemented them, promising to take my greetings back to the family members who were now too old to make the trip.
"Now, I feel my age -- and I grumble as I pack up for winter, thinking the whole time how much more work it will be the following spring when I have to unpack my store goods again. I guess I should be grateful for the work, counting up the stuff and packing it keeps me from thinking too much about Mary."
The old man's pause lasted much longer this time. His remaining coffee sloshed out of the cup he held in his other hand.
"Oh well," he said, forcing himself to stand, even struggling to straighten his back, which seemed bound and determined to remain bent. "I've talked too much."
He thanked me for listening, then hobbled off, his slight shape eventually fading into the landscape as the remaining Victorian Week tourists made their way down the promenade. He seemed to vanish before my eyes.