The sea, it calls me. Isn't that a line from a recent Disney movie? What a universal thought. It is easy to take for granted the majesty and wonder of all the magnificent glory that surrounds us.
I remember the first time I saw the ocean. Our family drove our little VW bug down to Daytona, sometime in the mid-to-late 1960s. We stayed in a campground, in a swampy tent. Air conditioning was rare and optional back then. When you grow up without it, you don't know that it matters. (Is this why we are fat? Is the air conditioning killing our metabolisms?) Us kids were too busy running around having grand adventures to worry about the heat. The adventures were generally just nature combined with imagination, no trinkets necessary (unless they were found objects along the paths).
Trudging to the beach is always the hardest part of such a trip. Everyone is loaded down with gear - the scene opens before us, the salty, thick air full of possibilities. The slog of the sand has always been difficult, whether I was young or old. The blissful touch of the water seems so far away, until you're up in it.
I recall stepping into the surf for the first time. I didn't anticipate not being able to stand up, as the sand sifted quickly out from under my feet. I fell face-forward, inhaling a mouth full of sand and briny sea. I attempted to stand, then was hit with another wave. This was misery. No one had told me the struggle. All I had heard was that the beach was glorious.
Eventually, after many tries, I began to feel the rhythm of the water, anticipating the ebbs and swells. Instead of fighting, I began to receive it, to flow with it. Decades later, while snow or water skiing, I should have applied the same principles. Alas, I didn't. It was either that or the Slate clumsiness.
In the water, however, I learned that I could be a ballerina or a dolphin. The possibilities were endless, though it definitely didn't start out that way. I've had my face scrubbed onto the bottom of the ocean, been tumbled by endless waves that almost drowned me, and dragged out helplessly by evil undertows (one time accompanied by five little boys on a raft). I eventually loved the water so much, I became a lifeguard and taught scads of children to swim.
In a typical extended summer, we will make at least a couple of trips to the beach. Our children never had any vacation wishes except to go with our extended family to a old beat-up camp by the sea. The cottages were cheap. You had to bring your own linens and pots and pans, but it was like heaven to all of us. We'd swing on our front porch, chatting and drinking coffee with every person who walked by. Sometimes we'd have 15 to 20 families there at the same time, renting the little places and making a party of it with family, church folk and other friends. We'd go for two weeks in May and often two weeks in September, for pennies on the dollar. The boys would stack up chairs by the pool and have contests of diving over them. How my children are alive is pretty much a mystery to anyone who knew them.
This year, there's been no beaching. Everyone was so busy, we did not do our usual family trip. There's grandchildren, jobs, obligations, that have made it much more difficult. I also had a wrist surgery gone very wrong that made it impossible for me to get into any body of water.
But here we are today and for the next eight days! One of my daughters-in-love along with their five children, overlooking the wondrous water. My wrist is healed; everyone is getting dressed as I write and I'm anticipating the crisp, salty surf and playing with them in the pool.
Sometimes, life gets rough, and you've cried out to the Lord, and you've surrendered to what He has ordered. Count yourself lucky if you get to drive to the edge of the earth and dive in. It reminds me that He is so much bigger than us, and yet, His eye is still on the sparrow and I know He watches me.
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