- Ice Plant Blooming on Santa Cruz Coast (April) 2009 copyright Maria von Brincken
Waking in darkness, the time of day some call the “hour of the wolf”– that time of legend when babies are born and people depart this world — my body programed to an east coast clock, I seized the gift of time offered before my scheduled meeting, and headed to the beach, or more accurately–the cliffs. I went looking for the spot that I loved to visit when I was a student in the university located up the hill above town. I wanted to watch the seals in the bay as I had some decades before. Wondering, I drove, would I find the spot? Would the seals be there diving for food? Would the road and turn-out still exist or would it have crumbled into the sea? Navigating within the darkness just as dawn was breaking, I found them– the turn-out, the surfers, the ice plant banks in flower, and the sun rise lighting the water just as I remembered. The landscape didn’t seem to have changed. I know it must have, but not that I could see. I was always a casual visitor arriving when transportation and free time coincided to provide the opportunity. There again after so many years I realised that the soft colors of the new day in this landscape–now ones renewed in memory– influences the color palette I use as a designer and artist to this day.
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