I first visited Crane Beach just days after starting the Masters in Landscape Architecture program at Harvard. Five of the women in my program and I packed our bags and headed to the beach for the day to relax and reset before our first semester. I remember just feeling so happy – how lucky was I to be in graduate school in such proximity to such a beautiful place!  I’ve been back several times since then, visiting the nearby Plum Island while is graduate school as part of an ecology class, playing in the sand at Crane Beach with friends throughout and after graduate school, and each time, I notice different things about this place. At the far south end of the beach, there’s an area where the waves are coming in from two directions and crash into each other, and you can stand right at their intersection and watch the waves crash between your toes. The water is much colder than I’m used to as a Midwesterner who grew up visiting Florida in the spring and Michigan in the summer, but a swim at Crane Beach is worth it for the occasional crab spotting!