Journal Entry — Morro Bay
I got into Morro Bay early afternoon. The kind of time where the day still has options but isn’t in a hurry about any of them. I didn’t linger on the ride. It got me where I needed to be.
I went straight to the beach. Shoes off. Club across my shoulder. The sand near the water was firm, dark where the tide had pulled back and left it packed down. I walked until the harbor mouth came into view, then took a couple swings near the edge of the shoreline. Nothing full. Just enough to feel the balance settle.
JR was waiting on a bench above the harbor, one of the old ones people stop at without knowing why. He sat with his legs stretched out, hands folded loosely in his lap, staring past the boats like he was running numbers only he could see. No clutter. No projects. Just him.
“You made it,” he said, standing when he saw me.
“I said I would.”
He smiled faintly, then his eyes dropped to the club.
“You’re still carrying that.”
“Seems to work,” I said.
“Yeah,” he replied. “It always did.”
We stood there for a bit, watching the harbor traffic move in slow, predictable lines. JR didn’t rush into conversation. He never had. When he did speak, it was about small things—boats that had changed hands, a slip that had gone empty, how the harbor felt quieter than it used to. Observations, not opinions.
Dinner came up naturally. He nodded toward the marina.
“Let’s walk.”
The place was close and unremarkable, which suited both of us. Inside, the noise flattened everything into a steady background hum. JR ordered a beer. I joined him.
“I thought you’d go tequila,” he said.
“Later,” I said.
He accepted that without comment.
Dinner was mostly catching up. JR talked in the way he always had—jumping tracks, circling back, abandoning stories halfway through once the interesting part had passed. Pieces of the old days surfaced, but never in full. Enough to remind. Not enough to explain.
“I still think about that night in the hills,” he said at one point, staring past the table.
“I know,” I said.
That closed it.
We paid and walked back toward the marina as the light started to thin. The skiff was tied up where he’d left it, lines uneven but solid. JR untied them without looking and pushed off, talking about an old receiver he’d been trying to bring back to life, his mind already elsewhere.
The ride out was short. He handled the skiff easily, even while drifting between thoughts. His boat sat fixed to a buoy farther out, exactly where it always was. No drift. No correction.
Aboard, the cabin told the real story. Messy but intentional. Tools everywhere. Open electronics stacked next to books. Nothing put away because nothing was finished. JR noticed me taking it in.
“It looks worse than it is,” he said.
“I doubt that,” I replied.
He grinned. “Fair.”
He handed me another beer and dropped into a seat across from me, pushing a pile of wires aside with his foot. Outside, the harbor had gone quiet in layers—the water against the hull, a distant engine, voices fading back toward shore.
After a while, he said, “There’s a guy here. Lives aboard over in the marina. Blues player.”
I waited.
“Elias Johnson,” he said. “Everyone calls him Red Tide.”
The name carried weight without him leaning on it.
“He plays a couple nights a week. Never misses. Hasn’t shown for the last two.”
“Anyone hear from him?” I asked.
“No.” JR took a drink. “That’s what bothers me. Red Tide is careful. Precise. He doesn’t drift.”
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, eyes unfocused like he was lining pieces up.
“I’m not saying something bad’s happened,” he said. “I’m saying something’s off. And when patterns break, it’s usually because something’s pushing on them.”
I nodded.
“I’ll listen around.”
“That’s all I wanted,” he said.
We sat there a while longer, the boat shifting slightly against the buoy, the cluttered cabin settling into quiet. No theories yet. No accusations. Just a small disturbance, finally named.
That was enough to stay.
Sand Rating: 6 / 10
Condition: Firm, dark, tide-smoothed
— BG
Travel light. Swing hard.
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