Nothing happens on Cape Cod until July 4th.

I worked on Cape Cod for many years. I witnessed various and sundry businessmen down there trying to fight this iron law like a white whale. They’d tow banners from biplanes and make radio ads and hire performers and put out sandwich boards and generally set their hair afire after they got that little flurry of interest and money on Memorial Day. I used to see their businesses slip beneath the foam, tangled in the lines trailing from the leviathan of the springtime’s cold water, high winds, and overcast skies all the time. The smart ones just opened the doors on July 3rd, and sold everything they had until they found themselves unscrewing things from the wall and putting tags on them, and running out of even the banana popsicles.

They’d show up on July Fourth, oh yes. And every Friday afternoon until Labor Day you’d know better than to to try the two bridges that allow you to enter Cape Cod over the canal that makes it an island, really, if you didn’t have two hours to kill. The rentals turn over at Saturday morning at eleven, so don’t try going the other way, then, either.

Let’s go down to Main Street in Harwichport. The Finast has Hood ice cream. And look, the Modern Theater sign says they have talking pictures now.