After the Storm ...

My story "After the Storm, the Cement Ship" in Necessary Fiction was inspired by the wreckage of the cement ship at Seacliff State Beach in Aptos, California, and by the wreckage of a storm that hit Capitola Beach in Capitola, California, in the winter of 2010.

Some people built structures out of the wreckage ...

and as the days went on there were more and more of these little cabins dotting the beach.

I wanted to capture a mood of wreckage and ruin by linking these two spaces in the story, having the family walk through the storm wreckage to wind up at the ruin of the ship, while all around them mud is sliding, trees are falling, and the entire world is on the edge of collapse. These spaces are, in fact, linked geographically. On a clear day, one can see the cement ship from Capitola Beach, and on a really clear day, one can see the power plant at Moss Landing, the city of Monterey, and the hills of Carmel, as one follows the horseshoe curve around Monterey Bay.