Hello from Mystic, Connecticut!
We are on a short vacation just four hours from home, here in this historical maritime village of southern New England.
Tomorrow my husband will help take the famous schooner The Brilliant out on a little harbor jaunt. He spent time crewing catamarans and other sailboats in his youth, and he has always wanted to go out on this boat, so this was one of his big gifts for his 50th birthday. Thank you, Uncle J.T.!
In preparation for this special event, we rented a seaside cottage via Air BnB that looks out on a little inlet marsh, and we arrived yesterday evening. After getting groceries and unpacking, Jer and I sipped local craft beer in Adirondack chairs looking out at the water while Daphne listened to her music and enjoyed the autumn sunset with us.
Today has been a special day for me and her especially.
We spent two hours at the famous Mystic Aquarium, where Daph’s favorite experience was the sea lion show. She sat fully engaged in the fifteen minute performance totally sans iPhone or iPad, a rarity, and cried a little when it was over. It was an impressive show, with three sea lions zooming through the water, leaping out, and dancing, waving, and doing handstands on the stage behind the tank. An actual story unfolded–the animals and their trainers made up the Sea Squad, and they were all fighting to clean up the beaches of the Pacific Northwest. The environmental message was kid-friendly and well-done, and the sea lions were sleek and graceful.
In fact, Daph was clear she needed as a souvenir a small sea lion plushie–$20!!– from the enormous gift shop (as large as any of the exhibits). Of course, her dad said yes.
She also enjoyed the beluga tank and stingray petting zoo.
It’s always a joy to see her immersed in something new, though it also reinforced how much she loves all things aquatic.
After that, we ventured over to the Olde Mistick Village to shop. There was a place I definitely needed to go–Alice’s Little Haunted Bookshop.
It was a brilliantly atmospheric brick-and-mortar horror merchant’s, and I could have browsed there all day.
I snapped a few quick pics and narrowed down my choices to Sir Walter Scott’s Supernatural Short Stories and Nettle and Bone by T. Kingfisher, both perfect for spooky season.
We absolutely need more genre-driven, specialty little brick-and-mortars in the world–am I right, fellow bibliophiles?
Mystic itself is a gorgeous blue-blooded New England seaside village. It exudes quiet Old Money wealth, so I’m glad I brought my Tiffany pearls.
I’m viewing this weekend not only as a wonderful family trip, but as a personal treat for having just had a story published in Spellbound.
It’s important that we writers treat ourselves. The publication day of a book or literary magazine is often quiet, so much so it can feel anticlimactic, so it’s important to do something for ourselves to honor our work. After all, we created something new, with our own imaginations, that didn’t exist in the world before now, and here it all is. That is absolutely magical, especially in this era of ever-encroaching AI.
Are you doing anything special to usher in the autumn season?
Or, if you’re a book lover like me, what would be your ideal brick-and-mortar bookshop? What would it look like, contain, exude? What titles and authors would be found there?
Thank you for reading. Happy autumn, and see you next week!
XOXO,
Jenn
Jennifer Shaw 