Capturing the essence of the beach with my phone is one thing, but in a painting - in real-time - it is a whole other thing.  I’m in awe of anyone who can paint in the moment - no photograph- just sitting in nature with a canvas, painting the scene in quick brushstrokes. You have to stay in the present and pay attention.  This painting practice is called plein air, a form of impressionism that my guest Annora does so well. At only 19, Annora is making herself known in our local artist scene at the beach where I live. You can see her sitting at the beach at sunrise with her canvas an ..read more

Capturing the essence of the beach with my phone is one thing, but in a painting - in real-time - it is a whole other thing.  I’m in awe of anyone who can paint in the moment - no photograph- just sitting in nature with a canvas, painting the scene in quick brushstrokes. You have to stay in the present and pay attention.  This painting practice is called plein air, a form of impressionism that my guest Annora does so well. At only 19, Annora is making herself known in our local artist scene at the beach where I live. You can see her sitting at the beach at sunrise with her canvas an ..read more

I was a guest on an Instagram live with Amanda from Northern TIdes Studio and Wallace J. Nichols, author of Blue Mind - talking about water, the Blue Mind movement, and the healing properties of the ocean.  Amanda asked how living at the beach has changed me. I don’t know why that question caught me off guard - it was a great question. I wasn’t really sure I had the answer - at least nothing I felt I could articulate at the moment.   If I had the chance to answer the question again, I would say that although I have always felt a connection to the beach and the ocean - now that I live ..read more

When I started thinking seriously about moving from land-locked Orlando to the beach, the first three questions people would ask were, “What beach?” “Where will you live?” and “What will you do?” I would say, “I haven’t decided what beach yet, but I’m sure I’ll find one with a couple of palm trees where I can hang a hammock,  and, I don’t know, I’ll make jewelry out of sea shells, and sell it to the tourists. It was a silly answer, but in my mind, I was serious - if that were what I had to do to live at the beach - I would do it.  Now, I live in a beach house (not a hammock), and in ..read more

It’s February, so in the spirit of this Month of Love, I asked my soulmate, Ernie, to join me on the podcast because it’s a very special month for us. Although I’ve talked about how we met and our journey to living out our vision here at the beach on the podcast before, I thought it would be the perfect time for Ernie to share some of his own beach stories and reminisce about our beach adventures together.   We talk about growing up in Tampa and always being in the water, camping, and “spring hopping,”  You’ll hear Ernie’s stories about a wild encounter he had on an Island beach in ..read more

Imagine, you’re about to do what might be the craziest thing you’ve ever done.  And you’re thinking this could be crazy good or crazy stupid. Then the “what ifs” start to creep into your consciousness: “What if something goes wrong?” “What if I’m not good enough?” “What if it turns out to be nothing but a waste of time and money?” That’s how I felt three years ago, staring bleary-eyed at my computer monitor, my hand nervously resting on the mouse, guiding a bold black arrow across the screen, stopping to hover over a bright green button that says “publish.” I spent at least 100 hours wo ..read more

Recently on The Beach Speaks, I posted an episode sharing my beach story as a guest on Rabiah Coon’s podcast More Than Work.  Today, I’m bringing Rabiah back - this time as my guest - to hear her beach story.  Rabiah currently lives in London, but she grew up near the beach in California. When she said she was coming home to California for the holidays, I thought it would be the perfect time to share her story on the podcast. For many of us, this is a time for sharing with family and friends, and when you listen to her story, you’ll find out that family and friends are two very i ..read more

Hey Beach lover, How is the beach speaking to you today? I’m sure you have noticed that I’ve been doing a lot of solo episodes: like, how I met my soulmate - on the beach,  watching fighter jets fly over the beach, and how learning to fly was a lot like moving to the beach -  and while it’s been a lot of fun sharing stories about how the beach speaks to me, I thought I’d do something different this time, and share more about my journey to the beach on this episode I recorded with Rabia Coon on her podcast More Than Work.  We first met as members of the “Squad Pod” - a slack gr ..read more

Many of you have asked me how I found the nerve to leave my job - to move to the beach - and not have a job to go to, and what beach? Where was I going to live?  I would laugh and say, I’m sure whatever beach I go to, there will be a couple of palm trees where I can hang a hammock, and I’ll make jewelry out of shells! It sounded silly when I said it out loud, but in my head, I was serious.  How DID I get here? I’ve done a lot of thinking about that recently, about the times in my life that I just said, I don’t know how this is going to work, but I’m going to do it.  It’s strange ..read more

If you are a regular listener to the podcast, you’ll know that I often talk about how I met my soulmate, quit my nine to five and moved to the beach - it almost always comes up in conversation when I meet someone new, and we get to talking about the beach.  Of all three, I get the most response from the “met my soulmate” part - like “that’s amazing!” Or “How did you do that?” or “I met my soulmate, too!” - and then they proceed to tell me their story.  I noticed how, in the past several conversations with my guests, the same topic “How we met our soulmate, partner, significant other ..read more