Down the Shore

I'd reserved Sunday for a family visit. Perhaps, I suggested, we could take a walk on the boardwalk and enjoy an early dinner.

Yes, it does snow at the beach. Evidently the sand held enough heat to fend off any accumulation from this early storm.

It was uplifting to see Asbury Park in its revitalizing state. I'm sure I rode the merry-go-round as a child; the building remains, though the carousel is long gone.

When the city slid into its deep decline, we'd stroll the boards through the neighboring town of Ocean Grove and turn back at the border. The line in the sand wasn't hard to miss; sketchy characters loitered on the Asbury side. It was no longer the town that Bruce romanticized.

Things are turning around, these days. A jazz band played as we strolled through a fair inside Convention Hall, where artisans were selling their wares.

I never had the chance to notice the architectural details, before.

The interior could use some more work, but somehow the building and its ornamental flourishes survived those sad decades of neglect.

And the wintry waves of the steely gray Atlantic roll on.