Civic Association Sign (Wordless Wednesday) and The Best Step (Words for Wednesday)

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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday and Sandee at Comedy Plus.     

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Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and has become a moveable feast of word or picture or music prompts to encourage us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.    

This month, the prompts are being provided by Cindi and posted on her page Of Dandelions and Sunshine.     

This week’s Challenge:

They say a picture is worth 1,000 words.  Paint us a picture with at least 100 words of your favorite vacation spot.

The Best Step

The best step, at least you think it’s the best step when you get there, is that first step onto the coral walkway around the pool.  It’s wet and it looks slick but because it’s made of coral you don’t slip, it has a rough texture that your toes can grip.

The breeze hits you, the scent of the chlorinated pool combined with sea air and sunscreen, and you just know it’s going to be a grand time.

Then you open the gate past the pool and step onto the walkway that takes you down to the beach, and you feel like that was the best step.  The feel of the gritty poly-resin boards, wet and sandy, tell your brain you’ve arrived, and then you think, but wait, there’s more!

That first step onto the white sugar sand at the end of the walkway, that’s the best step.  Soft and warm sand shifts under your feet, your eyes are drawn up and out to where sky and water come together.  There are usually a few puffy clouds around, and some birds, mostly gulls, herons, or pelicans flying past.  You hear the surf, smell the salt stronger than ever, see the children playing, building sand structures of all sorts and swimming while parents watch, it’s a joy.

After crossing the sand, you dip your toes into the cool water running up to meet you, rejoicing as it catches you by surprise and wets you more than you expected.  You laugh, the sound mixing with the splash of the water and the constant breeze, and you know you’ve finally taken the best step, into the fullness of all the sea and shore have to offer.

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Today is:

Bahti Meskerem -- Eritrea (Revolution Day)

Bonnat Pig Fair -- Bonnat, France

Building and Code Staff Appreciation Day

Chicken Boy's Day -- the mascot of the now defunct restaurant by that name, the 22 foot statue of a boy with a chicken's head was saved from destruction and is now a pop icon in L.A. on Route 66

Constitution Day/National Day -- Slovakia

Day of Knowledge -- Estonia (an official Flag Day); Russia

Disaster Prevention Day/Kanto Earthquake Memorial Day -- Japan

Ecclesiastical Year begins -- Orthodox Christian

Festival of Juno Regina and Jupiter Liber -- Ancient Roman Calendar

Hassaku Oshi-tsuki -- Tsuma, Oki Island, Japan (bull sumo, with bulls pushing each other out of the ring)

Mustaqillik Kuni -- Uzbekistan (Independence Day, 1991) 

National Cherry Popover Day

National No Rhyme (Nor Reason) Day -- the day to celebrate the amazing words in the English language that do not rhyme with any other words

Nutt Day -- for Emma M. Nutt, the first female telephone operator

Oyster Season begins

Partridge's Day -- patridge hunting season begins in UK

Presidential Message Day -- Mexico

Random Acts of Kindness Day -- New Zealand

Save the Koala Month -- anyone can help by "adopting" one    

Sing A Silly Song in Bed Day -- now, this one has no real rhyme or reason

Sneeze-Wobbling Festival -- Fairy Calendar

St. Fiacre's Day -- Ireland and France (the rest of the church celebrates this Patron of gardeners on August 30)

St. Gideon the Judge's Day (Patron of Saint-Gedeon-de-Beauce, Canada)

St. Giles' Day (Patron of the beggars, blacksmiths, breast feeding, cancer patients, disabled/handicapped people, epileptics, forests, hermits, horses, lepers, mentally ill people, noctiphobics, paupers and the poor, rams, spur makers, woods; Edinburgh, Scotland; Toifa, Italy; against breast cancer, epilepsy, fear of the night, insanity, leprosy, mental illness, noctiphobia, sterility)

St. Simeon Stylites' Day -- Eastern Orthodox Christian

Teacher's Day -- Singapore

Wattle Day -- Australia

Anniversary Today:

Benjamin Franklin marries Deborah Read, 1730

Birthdays Today:

Timothy Duane "Tim" Hardaway, 1966

Gloria Estefan, 1957

Dr. Phil McGraw, 1950

Barry Gibb, 1946

Lily Tomlin, 1939

Alan Dershowitz, 1938

Don Stroud, 1937

Seiji Ozawa, 1935

Conway Twitty, 1933

"Boxcar" Willie, 1931

Rocky Marciano, 1923

Yvonne DeCarlo, 1922

Vittorio Gassman, 1922

Walter Philip Reuther, 1907

Edgar Rice Burroughts, 1875

Englebert Humperdinck. 1854 (composer, esp of opera Hansel and Gretel)

Johann Pachelbel, 1653

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Art Linkletter's House Party"(TV), 1952

"Androcles and the Lion"(Play), 1913

Today in History:

Rabbi Moses Ben Nachman establishes a Jewish community in Jerusalem, 1267

Adi Granth, now known as Guru Granth Sahib, the holy scripture of Sikhs, was first installed at Harmandir Sahib, 1601

The first yacht race is held, between England's King Charles I and his brother James, 1661

Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa forms in California, 1772

Juno, one of the largest main belt asteroids, is discovered by German astronomer Karl Ludwig Harding, 1804

Narcissa Whitman, one of the first white women to settle west of the 

Rocky Mountains, arrives at Walla Walla, Washington, 1836

The first Pullman sleeping car is put into service, 1859

The Solar Superstorm/Carrington Event: a huge solar sunspot and solar flare storm that disrupted telegraphy and allowed the Aurora Borealis to be seen as far south as the Caribbean occurs, 1859

Joseph Lister performs the first antiseptic surgery, 1865

Robert T. Freeman becomes the first African American to graduate from the Harvard Dental School, 1867

The first underground rapid transit system in North America, the Boston Subway, opens, 1897

One of the first science fiction films ever, A Trip To The Moon, opens in France, 1902

Alberta and Saskatchewan become the 8th and 9th Canadian provinces, 1905

Martha, the last passenger pigeon, dies at the Cincinnati Zoo, 1914

The United States, Australia and New Zealand sign a mutual defense pact, called the ANZUS Treaty, 1951

In Reykjavík, Iceland, American Bobby Fischer beats Russian Boris Spassky and becomes the world chess champion, 1972

Canada adopts the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms as part of its Constitution, 1982

A joint French-American expedition locates the wreckage of the RMS Titanic, 1985

Luxembourg becomes the first nation to complete the transition to all digital tv broadcasting, 2006

After four Israeli settlers are shot at the Israeli settlement Beit Hagai, the Palestinian Authority arrested 250 members of Hamas, 2010

To avoid further fighting, Libya's Transitional Council extends the deadline to surrender for tribal leaders in Sirte, 2011

U.S. National Park officials notify 3,100 recent visitors of an outbreak of Hantavirus sourced to tent cabins in Yosemite National Park, 2012

In southwestern China, at least four people are killed by a 5.9-magnitude earthquake, 2013

Stock markets around the world fall after China reports a low value for its purchasing managers' index, suggesting that the nation's economy is slowing, 2015

Hurricane Dorian makes landfall on Elbow Cay in the Abaco Islands, northern Bahamas, as a category five storm with winds of 180mph (285km/h), 2019