Beach Day
At first, when you look up, all you can see is clouds…
But if you look twice, you might just see a rainbow.
PART I:
Charles knew that his feet were wet, even though he wasn’t really touching solid ground. The clothes beneath his vest were soggy, and even his outer layers were starting to give out. He hadn’t properly prepared for this beach vacation, and he knew that now. (Who was he kidding, he knew that then, but he’d chosen instead to procrastinate, stay up late, and gone out drinking).
This wasn’t his first time experiencing the pangs of shame, guilt, and loneliness that result from not being better equipped. Even as he’d prepared for his divorce, Charles had known he could have done better. He knew he’d left his partner for a reason, but often times, that reason felt unbeknownst to him.
All his life he’d been like this, shrugging off his own schedule. He knew it was a coping mechanism- not exactly shirking it, but delaying things long enough that he was lost before he even started, and never had enough time to put his full or best effort into it.
Reflecting back on miscarriage after miscarriage, he felt the sharp burn of all the past business & personal endeavors he’d mentally created, but never managed nor brought fully to term. The gray cloud hanging over him seemed to burst as it poured down and threatened to drown him in a mix of saltwater sea and emotion. His nagging inner voice dragged down on him like gravity, and beneath his feet, he felt the quickening pace of the sinking sand.
For months at the end of his marriage he’d searched for meaning and purpose, and in other ways for validation. He’d been to India, spending time at the ashrams, and to Thailand seeking Shanti with the monks. He’d sought out Christianity for a time period, after having a revelation about the healing light of Jesus from a reiki healer who seemed to know him, and he’d even tried searching in the bottom of several other men’s beds. One thing he’d learned for certain was this: Life offers a humorous path for those who are seeking answers. In a way, it had led him to the ends of the earth and right back home again.
Remembering something one of the monks had once passed on to him about happiness (essentially stating,“fake it ’til you make it.”), Charles widened his elbows, drew his mouth into a feigned smile and laughed heavily. As he did this, he tilted backwards and the umbrella ever-so-slightly lifted its brim, flinging water into his face and his attention flew upwards. Looking brightly into the gleaming sun, it suddenly shone down on him.
“Wow” he murmured. All this time walking on the beach, and he hadn’t even noticed the beauty that was quite utterly raining down on him.
Beneath the patterns of the scattered sunbeams, the ocean waves glistened. It really was beautiful here, he marveled. Each evening, the sun set over the waters in a magnificent display of colors, and if he got up early enough each morning it rose again from behind the mountaintops, peaking out cheekily at him. Charles liked to sit and drink his coffee while he doodled out the day’s color palate and daydreamed what it would look like if he could become one with the clouds. How quickly and easily he had mentally escaped and slipped back into a good part of his journey — if only his entire life could be like that. “But that’s the nature of anxiety and depression” Charles thought to himself. “It’s a combination of highs and lows.”
Waking from his seeming slumber, the colors seemed alive to him once again. He noticed the sky was bright despite the weather. Across the beach, he noticed a bright red crab sprinting away from a white seagull, it’s beak the hue of tangerines or perfectly ripe mangoes he’d eaten at the hotel breakfast. His earthenware beads he’d woven into a bracelet shone red with the fired clay, and contrasted against the porous black lava stone adjacent. The Bodhi seed mala his teacher Astrid had gifted him poked out from under his collar, and despite being wet, it still felt smooth and warm against his skin. Touching it to feel into their deep vibration, he took a deep, centering breath, rested against a pile of rock and driftwood, and steadied himself once again. He closed his eyes and took another deep breath in. He held it for four pauses, as he counted his gratitude for each of the Four Winds.
On the fifth count, he exhaled, and let his eyes flicker open. As they came into focus, they landed on the chain of crystals that bordered the spoked edges of his umbrella. It was vintage. He’d bought it at the flea market in Williamsburg at the end of the pier, while eating griddled Raclette baguette sandwiches with pickled peppers, and listening to a married couple of artisans tell him their love story, before the world ended and he’d decided to move there.
It had a nice weight to it. He spun it easily in his hand. Each prism caught the light, and glowing like miniature chandeliers they illuminated and sent dozens of little rainbows dancing forth, shrieking out gleefully from the rim. It had stopped raining. Closing the umbrella, Charles smiled again; this time, organically.
“What a great reminder” he chuckled as he slid the buckle around his hand, “Not to focus too much on the shadows or the perceived shelters we tend to create over ourselves.” Or at least, he did. Tossing the umbrella towards the shoreline, he lowered himself to meet the earth, stretched his body out onto the sand, and rolled joyfully towards the ocean.
PART 2
Charles had completed four or five revolutions through the sand, and was now laying merrily with his feet dangling in the surf, moving his arms wide and letting the final crest of its dying waves crash gently over him. He clutched fistfuls of seaweed and arranged shells into patterns across his chest, only to let the tide take them again. As he opened and closed his eyes slowly, he took the scene of the sea, the gulls, and the clouds fully in. Off in the distance, a cruise ship sailed by with its course seemingly pointed towards the horizon line.
Charles forgot himself as he imagined who might be riding on it. Was it filled with families, couples, hard-working Disney Characters doing their best to spark kids’ imaginations while singing the golden oldies hits of Alvin and the Chipmunks? He hummed along to his favorite tracks. Or maybe it was a singles cruise, filled with middle-aged adventurers hoping to meet their special someone while hitting up the pool deck/karaoke bar and getting their money’s worth of all-you-can-eat Lobster bisque? He wiggled his hips imagining himself nailing a cover of Shakira’s “Hips Don’t Lie” moments before Pitbull and Sean Paul blasted over the loud speaker.
He had read about cruise ships and the modern miracles of engineering never even imagined by Titanic creators or James Cameron. The Royal Caribbean had recently added the world’s longest water slide on a cruise ship to their line. It was called “The Blaster”, and Charles found this to be pretty hilarious. He imagined himself going down the 800-foot water slide, and started to twist and turn his body accordingly. He rotated and flailed his arms a bit, picking his pretend wedgie (seriously, why does that always happen at water parks?), and imagined himself needing to fart. The whole scene had him erupting with laughter.
He laid his body back flat and this time imagined himself sailing North to Alaska under clear skies filled with stars. He turned his head to the right and pretended to see the Northern Lights. Aurora Borealis was totally living up to the hype; they were breathtaking.
Just then, a child appeared, pulling him back into his current reality.
He first saw her sitting on a bit a driftwood about seven feet downwind. She couldn’t have been any older than ten.
“What are you doing, Mister?” she inquisitively asked of him.
“I’m playing” he called back.
“Oh. Okay” she answered.
How matter of fact. Her sheer lack of curiosity at his response drew an immediate awareness from him. The whole time he’d been playing make-believe, Charles hadn’t realized anyone could hear him laughing in the sand. To any adult who had been nearby, surely they would have thought he’d lost it- or at the very least, wondered what had so suddenly and rapidly changed for him?
After all, it was only fifteen minutes ago that he was moping down the shore, morose and gray, wearing a three piece business suit that had gotten caught in a rainstorm when suddenly, he had began smiling, dancing, singing, laughing, rolling towards the ocean and making shapes of angels in the sand.
Her childlike curiosity and inquisitiveness drew an instantaneous playfulness back out of him. “What game are you playing, my little friend?”
“Don’t call me little!” she retorted back.
“Oh yes, my apologies.” he chuckled. “What game are you playing, ma’am?”
“I’m playing roly polys” she answered him.
Without hesitating she jumped off the driftwood headfirst, and rolled over her shoulders into the sand. She continued in a forward roll over and over and over again, beelining for a three-tiered sandcastle that stood about 20 feet in the distance. Her little brother came running back out of the ocean when he saw this, motioning to her frantically. “Ariel, STOP IT!” he cried out. “Don’t you dare knock it over again!”
But it was too late for that. Headfirst, she toppled over the castle, and raining down around her came figurine mages and a petite little prince. Her brother arrived on the scene in that instant and, forgetting his anger, he melted into character. “Noooo! What will become of my kingdom?” he cried, as he faked his own death and fell, joining his sister in the sand.
Ariel laughed and spotted the man’s umbrella, abandoned just near them. Her palms opened wide as she grabbed it, still in stitches, and she brought the vintage parasol up over them. The crystals glistened in the midday sun.
“This will protect us from the magic” she said.
“What irony” Charles thought, as he laid back and laughed at them. It wasn’t until letting go of it that the magic had been evident, or even available to him.
The end. ❤