20F-4 (March 27) The Conquerors Conquered

There were four members of the Happy Band of Goblikitepe Shovelers when I arrived. Hamish tossing up a storm, Veronica with what had been Hamish's shovel, which fitted her well, Mark with his earthworks, and Timothy doing details and supervision.

Four people can move a lot of sand. The lifeguard came by to deliver a Stern Lecture about Depth of Holes. Justified, I think, as I've nearly fallen into some deep holes people have dug. Timothy's usual practice is to make his trenches wide and shallow, but once Hamish gets a shovel in his hands he's hard to stop.

There was a tide-cleaned spot on the south, sand nicely dampened, so I set up there. Everyone else concentrated on their task, and the central pile assumed immense proportions as I slowly filled my form. By the time I was into carving, they'd done their day's work and were making plans for the next.

There was hilarity and an obviously non-compliant Official Builders Photo with the mound in the background. What would tomorrow bring? I held up my tiny carving tool while they brandished their heavy shovels. Congratulations! Another day of accomplishment, bringing smiles to beach-goers.

I went on with my carving. I wanted more of the sinuous ridges that I'd had in F-3, but they are surprisingly hard to bring out in the real sand. I learned more about this coarser medium, and started thinking about the next one as I cleaned up. By this time I was alone.

While walking around, looking for good photographic angles, I found the shovel Timothy had said was missing, left lying on the beach below Mark's earthworks. I picked it up. I'd bring it to him the next time I came to sculpt.

While I was loading equipment back onto the cart, I saw something familiar mostly buried in the sand. When Timothy's previous build was bulldozed, he lost both of his "Palladions," the finial logs. Up from the sand I pulled, with effort, the Lesser Palladion, disguised as a chunk of eucalyptus. I carried it over to the mound and placed it where Timothy would see it the next day; I'm not qualified in dealing with palladions.

Saturday morning I thought about going for another sculpture, but was still pretty well beaten up so I went to a poetry reading instead. After that I thought about taking Timoth's shovel back to the beach. I brought up the surf cam... and there was no one on the beach. Late, perhaps? I checked again an hour later. No people.

Then I thought to check his Instagram page. There was a reference to the Trojan horse, and some comments that suggested the beach had been closed. I dug for more info and discovered that yes, the government has decided that beaches are hazardous, so they're all closed.

The good point is that my sculpture stood for two days, getting knocked down by people not obeying the closure sometime Sunday afternoon. The bad point is that the Happy Band of Shovelers is sitting at home, prevented from the daily worship of the real world.

You can take a look at Timoth's Instagram accounts at goblikitepe. Maybe that builder photo was just too much for the powers-that-be.