I mean really walk on the Boardwalk – enjoying every step, every breath of that tonic air, every color and sound, every person I see.

For the past year, my daily Boardwalk walks have been worried walks, searching walks, thinking walks, note-taking walks.

For the past year we of Boca Cape Films – Tony, Joanne, and Anthony Deutsch, and Raymond Becker — have been filming and editing a sequel to the documentary Boardwalk, Greetings From Wildwood By-the-Sea called, logically, Boardwalk II: Back to Wildwood and now its substantially finished and the Boardwalk is no longer a movie set to me.

I made the first movie with my old partners at Longshore Films, Joe Van Blunk and Gus Rosanio, and they and the estimable Doug Leirer, who shot most of the movie, edited it. Joe and I wrote it and Joe and Gus directed it and I narrated it and was the on-camera Boardwalk tour guide, so to speak.

With Boardwalk II, I shared direction with Tony and edited it with Anthony and Raymond, in addition to writing and narrating it and being the on-camera guy, so this was a journey into new waters for me, and the whole time I’m thinking that the first Boardwalk movie was good enough to get on PBS and would we be able to do that, too?

I think we have a shot. It’s a good movie, heartfelt and poetic, like the first one, and in the almost 15 years since we shot the first one I’ve learned a lot more about the Boardwalk and was able to translate that into another movie that should appeal to anybody who knows the fabled Jersey Shore.

I learned a lot about our kind of movies and about myself in the year of making Boardwalk II. I guess it can be summed up like this: make a plan and then follow your heart as the plan disintegrates like fog in the sunshine of reality. We had to deal with the cops three times, crazed tee-shirt kings, and the weather gods, but everybody acted like the troupers we are and we got it done pretty much how and when we wanted. We went from citizens to film-makers in that year and I think we did a hell of a job.

If you want to judge for yourself, I hope you have the chance on PBS, or if you want to re-order a copy, call me at 609-465-9968.