We just returned from a week at the Outer Banks with our family, a trip that is the highlight of our year. One of our favorite hangouts there is Duck’s Cottage, a bookstore/coffee shop with comfy couches on the porch, a small selection of books (from local and literary to “Shades of Grey”), and the requisite coffee drinks and snacks that make one want to settle in with a good book. I love this picture of the store, as the sign emphasizes the store’s curated quality: coffee-news-books-pastries. I would eliminate the “news,” as I already get more news updates than I need, but the rest? What any vacation should have plenty of.
From “A Miracle for Breakfast,” by Elizabeth Bishop:
Every day, in the sun,
at breakfast time I sit on my balcony
with my feet up, and drink gallons of coffee.We licked up the crumb and swallowed the coffee.
A window across the river caught the sun
as if the miracle were working, on the wrong balcony.
Between Gods 