Spontaneous Pilgrimage to the Cape

Last night, just before the fog of sleep settled in, Sadie mumbled something into the pillow that sounded like a half-formed thought. I caught the gist of it, though—“We should go to the Cape tomorrow.” I didn’t even blink. Just turned to her, kissed her temple, and said, “Okay.” No debates. No logistics. Just that soft and simple “okay,” the way you do when the person you love makes a wish, and you know it would be criminal not to grant it.   Today’s my off-call day from the hospital, the rare kind of Wednesday that feels like it was handed down from Olympus itself. Sadie had already decided to clear her patient schedule—no small thing for a Bavarian-born ICU doc whose clinic usually runs like a Formula One pit crew—and I figured, well, if not now, when?   So I got up early. Very early. The sun hadn’t even had the decency to stretch yet. I let Sadie keep sleeping, her breath slow and steady beneath the linen, while I slipped out of bed and padded downstairs barefoot like some half-awake monk on a mission.   I showered quickly, pulled on a soft gray T-shirt and jeans, and then headed out the door and into the misty morning light. The air outside had that strange, silvery hue New England mornings often carry when the sky isn’t quite sure what kind of day it wants to be. The humidity was there, a low murmur of it, but the temperature was agreeable.   The 1982 Porsche 911SC was waiting like a coiled thought in the garage. Black as ink, growling just a little as I turned the key and backed it out onto the gravel. The car always feels like a small rebellion—an unapologetic callback to a different era. A time when men didn’t ask for cupholders and cars didn’t apologize for being loud. It rumbled with its usual defiant spirit as I drove into Chepachet to fill her up. The gas station on the main road was empty, save for an old guy in a Red Sox cap grabbing a scratch ticket and an iced coffee. He looked over at the Porsche, gave me a slight nod—the kind old-timers give when they recognize a machine with soul—and then went back to his morning ritual.   Once the tank was full and the 911 had that satisfying “click” of the gas cap, I drove the long way home, past the Harmony Corner Store, past the pond, past the miles of green that always make me feel like I’m living inside a poem I haven’t quite finished writing yet.   Sadie was just stepping out of the shower when I returned. Her dark hair was wrapped in a towel, her skin still warm from the water. She was humming something—maybe Mozart, maybe Madonna, it’s always a bit of both with her—and as soon as she saw me, she smiled like she already knew I had filled the tank.   “We’ll get lunch,” she said, adjusting the towel and walking barefoot into the closet. “And maybe dinner. Depending.”   Which is code, of course, for absolutely dinner too.   I made us a pot of strong French roast while she got ready. There’s something deeply grounding about the sound of boiling water and the slow drip of a pour-over. I took the time to toast a couple slices of sourdough, slather them with salted butter, and sliced some strawberries. Just a little something to hold us over.   The weather’s still playing coy. The sky’s a watercolor smudge of greys and blues, with no clear allegiance to either sun or storm. But that’s never stopped us before. Hell, half our Cape days have been fog-wrapped and damp, and some of those have been the best ones—eating lobster rolls under a beach umbrella in a drizzle, walking barefoot along the shoreline with mist clinging to our hair, finding half-forgotten bookstores tucked between fudge shops and oyster shacks.   We have no destination. That’s the best part. We’ve been doing this almost every other week since June—a soft ritual born of spontaneity, a refusal to let life become predictable. Chatham, Sandwich, Truro, Wellfleet, even the underloved and over-touristed Hyannis—they’re all fair game. We’ll drive until something pulls us in, some serendipitous little bistro with wine by the carafe and a crab cake special, or a weather-beaten shack on the dunes that smells like fried clams and sunscreen.   There’s a certain poetry in being untethered, in letting the road decide the cadence of your day. We’ve earned it. After the codes, the call lights, the midnight surgeries, the weight of the pager and the heartbreak of modern medicine—days like this are salvation. A tiny rebellion against the grind. A shared breath.   She’s calling from upstairs now, saying she’s ready. Which means the road is too.   And so we’ll go. Into the grey. Into the salt and the wind. Into lunch, and definitely dinner. Into the day we didn’t plan—but that, I suspect, will be the kind we remember.