In Cádiz, I stumbled into a neighborhood celebration not meant for tourists but for each other—where generations gathered in song, color, and joy. Years later, in Santa Fe and again at a wedding, I found that same spirit of belonging: communities keeping tradition alive not as performance, but as love passed forward.

What makes the Hospice Cup Shore Party unlike any other party on the Bay? It took me years to put it into words.

Fine droplets fell on the sea, each one a solitary note in an empty concert hall. With no wind, no wake, no voices, the rain gloried in its solo, a sound I had never heard so purely before.