the rix mix

On a Friday afternoon in August 1994, as Megan & I started the long trip home from Wildwood. we drove slowly up Surf Ave. looking for possible places to stay the next summer. Then, just a few blocks south of the Inlet, we saw this:
A pink & white cottage with a separate single-story row of rooms behind it. A motor court, really. Outside, a man was on a ladder, painting the porch trim. There was a portable workbench set up in the small parking lot. A woman on the porch was watering flowers in pots. How had I missed this place on previous trips? We pulled over in front of The Kismet, got out & went over to talk to the flower woman. She & her husband had bought The Kismet that year from the old widow of the man who had built it himself in the 50s. They were restoring it to more-or-less its original look. They lived there with their teenaged son who was soon off to college. This was their dream. Their rates were modest. No pool. No gameroom. Open through Oct, maybe a bit longer. It was a quiet place. She looked over my punkish, considerably younger companion with her close-cropped hair & multiple ear-piercings, the short stocky frame of a former All-County field hockey player. Well, yeah, we were a peculiar couple. But Megan also possessed a soft Piscean face that put people at ease, & we had been together for 18 months. The lady gave us a business card. We got back in the car, drove three short blocks; on the left was the lighthouse, turn right for the ocean & beach, the choppy waters of Hereford Inlet straight ahead. The Kismet was it.

Labels: jersey shore, motel hotel, Wildwoods NJ