To look at Frank is to remember me, young, crawling among wood set up for a bonfire, and his huge hand pulling me away from a toppling log. Had my father lived into his sixties he might have looked like Frank, with the same yellowed teeth, the reddish freckles. His eyebrows curl upward and disappear beneath the brim of an aging canvas hat he's never without. When he smiles his face breaks into the splotchy weathered lines of an Irishman with too many years in the sun. Frank is a boatwright and a good man who has known my family since before I was born. He has a skiff with him, a beautiful vessel that looks as if it's been carved from a single piece of wood. Outsiders can't walk these shores.Īt the bottom of the steps Frank McAvoy waves to me before turning his gaze to the cliff. My sister, Enola, and I used to run shoeless in the summers until the pavement got so hot our toes sank into the tar. On the north shore few things are more essential than hard feet. I've been delinquent in breaking in my calluses this year and my feet hurt where stones chew at them. I walk toward the wooden stairs that sprawl down the cliff and lean into the sand. But we librarians are known for being resourceful. My father's apathy left me to inherit an unfixable problem, one too costly for a librarian in Napawset. Measures that should have been taken-bulkheads, terracing-weren't. The Long Island Sound is peppered with the remains of homes and lifetimes, all ground to sand in its greedy maw. The place where I've spent my entire life is unlikely to survive the fall storm season. Last night's storm tore land and churned water, littering the beach with bottles, seaweed, and horseshoe crab carapaces. Perched on the bluff's edge, the house is in danger.

The book of speculation by erika swyler