Moonrise at Alta Mira

Glider time, 8:25 p.m., August 8. Sunsets are generally clear here, moreso than the sunrise hours, when the cool ocean and the warm earth collaborate on what we call the “marine layer.” In summer, it is almost always warm enough throughout the day to burn off the low clouds or fog and let us have a view of sunset events such as these.

The weather changed slightly today – as much as we can say the “weather changes” in San Diego. The weather does change, but it takes months. Today’s subtleties involved a repositioning of southwest high pressure which created a tug on moisture from the south, called “monsoon moisture” here. The humidity was up, and there were high clouds, and the eastern orientation of this system kept the coastal areas clear of evening haze.

The result is glider time like this. The moon schedule, according to the paper, was to rise at 7:36, our time, but that time is keyed to the flat horizon in our time zone, and the actual moonrise occurs when the edge of the moon arrives at the actual horizon laid down by the foothills that lie just to our east. It was almost 8 when the moon, like a pearl, cultured itself from the earth. It was special tonight, but we are almost at that time, the October full moon, when the sun sets and the moon rises at the same time. This is an impossibly beautiful event, and complete evidence that, no matter who you are or what your possessions are, you can’t have it all. You can’t look at the sunset and the moonrise at the same time. You have to turn to one and then the other.

Tonight I am working on a new computer, flat screen, lots of RAM, etc. Karen saw I needed a new computer, then with Bill’s help (her son), ordered it, and then it arrived and she spent an entire day last week, with Bill’s help, getting it up and operating. Late in the day, she showed me an ad from that morning’s New York Times. It was a Tiffany ad, showing gorgeous diamond earrings for only $9,800. “After getting this computer running, I think these would be nice,” she said, tongue in cheek. And they would. She would wear them beautifully, and she damn sure earned them.

Right now, though, I am cash poor. Instead I gave her tripod equipment for her camera. “The earrings are a couple of years away, but you can make some beautiful things with these,” I wrote her in a card. Tonight she set up the tripod and camera for the first time, and gave us a keepsake of one of the most beautiful things on this earth that either of us has ever seen.