Since I awoke this morning – an ideal late summer day – I have been imagining life in Provincetown on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. I have pictured in my mind the misty skies of early morning over the Ocean; or the smell of freshly made donoughts from the bakery at the Lobster Pot where the night before I had eaten overlooking the bay; smoking cigarettes and drinking neat Scotch whiskey from a tiny tumbler; swiming in the sea and sunbathing on the beach; or breakfast at a restaruant among the noisy crowds on Commercial Street.

For years it was a tradition of mine to go to the Cape around this time of year, normally preceded by Labour Day and continuing thereafter for anything from one to three weeks. The last time I was there within the scope of this so-called tradition was over thirty years ago when I visited alone because at the last minute my traveling companion cancelled for business reasons.  I decided to go on my own in any event.  I had just bought a new 8-cylinder Oldsmobile Cutlass convertible coloured emerald green with a beige rag top. The customary autumnal weather beckoned me. Although I enjoyed the drive immensely, it turned out to have been a mistake. I either felt lonely or other people felt lonely for me (they invited me to join them for dinner or outings, that sort of stuff). But it never was quite the same as it had been before.

Years afterwards my partner and I went to Cape Cod together for the first time. Though we revelled at the Tea Dance; though we drank the booze and overlooked the glistening harbour; though we visited the beaches, it was the only time we’ve done so since. Some things just can’t be repeated. Nor upon reflection do I suspect we’ll ever try to do so again. Frankly we’ve translated those early memories on the Cape to later memories on the Gulf of Mexico or the Mediterranean. And, to be completely candid, we’ve lately resolved that those days too may also be filed into a drawer as we now prefer the tranquillity and familiarity of Hilton Head Island in South Carolina.

Curiously perhaps the lesson arising from this travel log is not that things change; rather that paradise gets closer and closer to home. For reasons I cannot explain, my preoccupation with the outside world has promulgated an infinite definition. It is not entirely without logic that once having surpassed three-quarters a century (as I have done) there are limitations which arise commensurately. It is not beyond understanding that any place on earth will change over half a century. When for example several years go we visited Halifax, Nova Scotia (my law school haunt) the transitions were for me remarkable.  Indeed the composition was completely changed from my recollection.  On the other hand, our stay at the Westin Nova Scotian Hotel on the waterfront was exemplary compared to what it would have been 50 years before. The same can be said of the revitalized pier at Key West when we returned over 30 years after my introduction and stayed at the Waldorf Astoria Casa Marina. Coincidentally we’ve also sidelined Key West.

Once again the message is not that things change or that one cannot repeat the past; instead the message is that there are new ways to do things, new avenues of exploration (including what is right before one’s eyes). As I have indicated, I am uncertain how to explain this awakening or whatever it is.  But I am quite certain that I am onto something here. I feel as though I have been overtaken by more flavour, more energy, more gusto, more transparency, more resolve, more meaning than I have ever had before. I am not sure how one describes Paradise but I can tell you quite honestly I feel as though I am bordering the territory. There are so many perceptions I now have that stimulate within me whatever particle it is that corresponds to soothing sublimity that I can’t imagine anything more improving, more delightful, more fortuitous or rewarding.  Last evening at table for example I suddenly fell into a confession of the innumerable advantages of having been a sole practitioner in a small rural town. I went on at some length extolling the virtues of being one’s own boss, including walking to work with one’s dog on a wintry day. Though I wouldn’t expect to be believed, I can also tell you that there is someone else to be blamed for this peculiarity. Things haven’t happened by magic.  There are elements at work, serious mental states and resourcefulness underlying the dissipating commotion. For the moment however I’ll cling to the disparateness of chance and idealism as the cause of this exceedingly palpable Paradise.