And So.

Hands gestured on the sandy shore. Fingers pointing at wrists and imaginary watches. Time to go. I began to walk slowly to where the bodies were waiting. Leave the ocean once and for all. Wrap up. Say your goodbyes and return to the cold from whence you came.

I caught a surf the last few feet, tumbling awkwardly onto the shallow edge. Ungraceful last words. But then how hard to get out of that water, how difficult to take the last step. I turned around and ran straight back into the sea, diving with ferocious eagerness into the crashing wave and swimming, swimming back out. Just one more dive. I dipped my head under the surface, let my legs kick into the air and push me down to the rough sandy bottom, swimming through wave after wave. I'd come up for air and dive again into the warm water, immersing myself not only in its soft wetness but in all that it has meant to me these last weeks. Every time I tried to get up I ended up running right back out, like a lover torn from her object of affection at the airport gate and unable to leave without just one last kiss, one last violent embrace. But once more is never enough. I never will have had enough.

Bags lie packed in a hotel room outside Adelaide. Bottles of wine, trinkets of memorabilia and sandy beach towels fill suitcases, while piles of warm winter clothing lie ready for travel. The end is nigh. A month of Australia dries on my skin, mingles with the salty sea, the sand between my toes, with white eyelashes and brown shoulders. A month of Australia lingers in my accent, the slowness of my step, the quickness of my smile.

They say in New York another snow storm has shut down the city. I arrive thus like I left, amidst flurries of uncertainty in the remnants of winter's havoc. It seems fitting somehow. New York does not ease you into anything. You should be glad it lets you back in at all after such an abandonment. I take a deep breath. Start over.

Go Home.

Civilisation

Once again tall buildings, wide streets. Unknown people and sprawling suburbs. We spend a relaxing evening with friends by the barbecue, chatting away the hours in our quaint and relaxed settings while the sun sets on beautifully groomed plumerias and quietly landing airplanes.

The warm water of Darling Harbour trickles through my lungs and revives me again. I miss the ocean the minute I get out. It occurs to me again that I am not cityfolk. It has been occurring to me for the past three decades.

It doesn't make me love New York any less.

I suppose, in the end, that's the trouble.

On Sand

Beaches. Stretching into foreverness, beaches. Miles of sand, squeaky sand under my toes and we never reach the end of it. We pass by the beach with the lifeguards; it is crowded. We learn to read the rip tides and stay on our unprotected stretches in solitude. It will tug at you, but if you survive, you are glad you went there.

We move in to the only inhabitable restaurant and bar in town; when they try to close up, we try to order another bottle. We end up bringing it with us when it's too late to stay: how young the bartenders. This is youth; we are too old to do it over. Stepping lightly onto the beach in the dark, we bring our screw cork with us, and the light house in the distance guides us. Somebody has built a fire but we stay in the black ink of our corner, drinking dredges and filling our clothes with sand. Bruises appear on my body but laughter bubbles in my chest. How dark the night, how light the evening.

If I could stay in this alternate reality forever, perhaps I might. Perhaps I should have, when the chance was offered.

What I've learned so far, is it's never too late to take your chances. It's really only you, who stand in your way.

Tides

And then the clouds cleared, the sun returned and all was well with the world. I forgot my concerns, my impatient pacings around the living room carpet, and threw myself into the sea again with a laugh. We sat on the neighbors' balcony and let the sun set over the beach, over the cicadas in the bush; I forgot there was ever rain.

But sleep was short, before the storm raged through my open windows and woke me. Hours pass and I find no rest. My teeth worry me, my life worries me. I am wide awake and hungry.

It's such a cliché. How my mood rises and falls with the movements of the clouds. I hang on for dear life.

What other option is there?

Rip Tide

My body collapses, my steps slow and I fall onto the sand. It's time for a break. But then I turn around, I see the sea rolling to shore, turquoise waves crashing one by one into white froth at the water's edge, and I cannot help myself: I am pulled back in. I dive quickly into approaching waves, swimming feverishly out, out to where the big swells are. I try to stand but the current is strong, it pulls me to the side and I fight it, fight it, until I simply let go and am swept away. Far away I spot it: the next big wave. I wait for it, gauge where it will crest, position my body just right, until I feel that familiar tug backwards, leap in, and surf all the way to shore in one long, overwhelmingly powerful roll. I immediately dive back out, let my body float across green and blue waters until the moment is right again.

Hours pass, I am oblivious to their steady gait. Nothing is relevant but the next wave, the next dive, the feeling of cool Pacific water against my skin. When we leave the beach, I stare at it from the house and long for it, immediately. Much later, I still feel the push and pull of the ocean on my body. Every breath a roll of the tide.

I am lost to sea. I am found.