Local

Home is where the heart is, or so says Jen H. in her challenge to show “Local.”

She goes on to say: “Home is what and who is local — the places and people we know by heart.”

I live near, but not on, the coast. My heart is where you can hear the surf when you open your window. Smell salt in the ocean spray. Even fight off the seagulls looking for a handout and hovering precariously overhead.

The nearest “local” town for me, a place where many friends live and the coastline is long and full of fun spots, is Pacifica, California. It’s only four miles to the beach but it’s a world apart. It’s on the west side of the San Andreas Fault and I live just 300 yards on the east side of the fault. To go west from where I live I have to drive about 6 miles south to Highway 92 or about 3 miles north to Sharp Park Road. In that 9 mile stretch there’s nothing but about 30,000 acres of open space. Pacifica is squeezed between Sweeney Ridge and the Pacific Ocean on the west side of all that open space. It’s a town of little valley communities all strung together by Highway One. The Manor district in the north, Sharp Park, Vallemar, Rockaway and Linda Mar are separate and distinct communities that unite under the Pacifica banner for the annual Fogfest in September. You know you have reached a unique place when the main annual celebration focuses on the near ever present fog.