Thud thud thud gasp thud gasp gasp thud thud thud...my heart pounds in my ears, my chest tight from a shortness of oxygen...pay attention...slow deep, meaningful breaths...slow down...blank the brain...hold it back. Did you know it only takes 1 false drop for the alchemist to taint a moment?
The salt air tickled my nose as the long-familiar scenery sped by on the darkening road. It's been so long: too long, a magical place for me, a home. A spontaneous deal with the devil allowed me a visit to la Mer. O I didn't care. It felt wonderful and exciting and right.
We pulled up to our 24 home at well past bedtime. Anya sensed the change in atmophere and awoke with fascination at this strange place. She wandered and touched and smelled and breathed deeply. Freyja and Bailey wagged and bowed, and learned the place while good friends settled into beers and stories. The trax, second floor deck beconed for company with a rocker and plenty of seating. The house was sparse, but contained all that was needed for a life outside of reality with no maintenance required. I shut the bedroom door behind me and cradled Anya in the full sized bed, hoping she would relax back into slumber. Alas...you know how the story goes...she tossed and turned and grabbed at my locks and kicked my ribs and at 30.75 inches long nearly hogged the expanse of mattress. I put her in the pack n play only to have her wake the other house guests...grunt...long night ahead.
At odd intervals throughout the night sleep was granted, then denied, then granted again. The antique window unit struggled to maintain what should have been a comfortable temperature...I should have put the ceiling fan on. But ahh you could still smell peace in this place. With so little sleep, yet enough, Anya woke at 7:30am with a smile and curiosity; I was only too eager to share with her my secret love.
Pleasantries and coffee filled the early morning as we sat on the balcony watching the sun burn off the dewy air. We have no where to be and no where to go just breath. Anya fascinated by the grainy stuff sticking to her feet and hands, didn't know if she should cry or lick or rub into her hair the small granuals..."that's sand honey, o no don't eat it, do this to shake it off." She waved to the sea gulls that past by and snuggled with the doggies keeping her special company in this strange land. At about that time we ventured off to take Freyja and Bailey on an adventure to Poseindon's realm.
Longport beach: an amusement park for the furry variety. Freyja has never been to the beach, never seen an ocean, and never ran free without blockade fencing; there are far a few locations where Charlie Brown doesn't resonate, "No Dogs Allowed." We all walked onto the small and rugged beach...not quiet what I had envisioned, but should have expected. Rocks and seaweed and dark, muddy sand marked the short beach along the road between here and there. A few other canine vacationers were already on the scene racing in the sand and waves like 5 year olds in Chuckie Cheese. Leashed and testing we laid out a towel and Anya's bucket in a random clear spot wondering if Bailey would show Freyja the joys of a beach dog life.
Within a few breaths Freyja was chomping to get at the foaming white-caps taunting her and chase the wet, smelly playmates on the softness beneath her paws. Rich got brave and disconnected her leash, and we stood there holding in the salty air until we were confident Freyja had found utter pleasure. She sprinted and chased and ran laps and bound into the rough sea. She played tag and catch and bounced and laughed as only a dog could. She was her old self, chasing Bailey around the magical island. Anya was tickled to see so many doggies in one place. Some greeted her with licks and nudges, but mostly they ignored her for the overwhelming fancy of the sea. After an hour of non stop movement univited guests swarmed the beach at Longport, inflicting misery on all variety of life. They were here and there and merciless. Green Heads, the dreaded mascot of the Jersey Shore...and hungry. I kept Anya in movement and bore their mealtime pain. In the water, outside the water...swatting and ouching. Soon the others were doing the same dance as I and the beach quickly cleared. Freyja and Bailey laid down in the back exhausted and gratful for the beach dog adventure.
Time for pizza lunch and naps. It seemed like we had already enjoyed a full day that was barely half begun.
Perfect Day part two was for the 2 leggers. Towels and blakets and chairs and water bottles and snacks and O my packed into bags and the car. The sun had gotten hot and the sky clear in this after noon hour. I hadn't been to a Sea Isle beach since my teens: that was too long ago now. I vaguely remembered the difference from Wildwood Crest and the beach home of my adult years...as foreign as Sea Isle seemed, the more like home it felt. I carried Anya through the hotest white sand at the entry point while the boys carried everything to our landing space. Anya was overstimulated by all the people and colorful blankes and umbrellas and playing, screaming children of all ages. She looked outward at the expanse of the sea and smiled...my child the pisces, just like her mother.
We found a spot before the waterline, but beyond the hot dry sand....perfect. We set up camp quickly and darted across the broken shells and seaweed to the water - a chill, then refreshing. Anya hesitated as the first wave ended its traverse inches beyond her ankles. She splashed a bit as the second one surprised her little aqua shoes. She walked forward a few steps to touch the next wave that didn't quite make it far enough...then she was hooked. We held her one on each side tightly as she tried to venture a little deeper each wave. Soon she was waist deep and giggling in delight. No sooner the water fell back into the sea and she dizzily teettered backwards, confused. After we were all cool we introduced her to sand.
I grab the bucket and guide Anya towards the little hill just in front of our blanket. Some kids earlier in the day had dug a trench and remnants of castle dreams cluttered the area. I plunked down in the sand, which makes me cringe for a moment, then I plop Anya down next to me. Instantly she lifts her sandy hands flat, towards me not sure whether to cry or be mad. I show her my hands and how I slapped them together to get the sand off, then I toss a pile of sand onto her leg and over my ankle. She smiles, but still holds those hands stiffly outward. I hand her the shovel. She forgets her hands and begins digging. She wrecks each bucket tower I build and is totally absorbed in this digging thing. Feeling the hot sun bake on my back Anya and I go back to the ocean edge for some cooling off.
Slashing away this time I sit her down in the shallows and show her the mini clams and how they dig as the water pulls back. She is fascinated by these tiny, colorful diggers. We sat there ebbing and flowing with the waves. She didn't mind dirty hands in this sand and picked it up and let it flow through her fingers. A few times some clams found their way ito her mouth. Poor things with me shoving my fingers into her clamped jaws to rescue the mini mollusks. This spot in between the wet and dry worlds was Anya's favorite. Can't say I disagreed either. Even daddy came down to join us too.
After some time I needed a cool down and left daddy and Anya to play in the waves. I slowly stepped through the water, stopping every few feet; it had been years since I bathed in the sea. I wasn't close to either lifeguard stand, and wasn't so sure of my footing and strength in Sponge Bob's realm, and frankly didn't feel like joining Bikini Bottom for eternity. I looked beyond to the cluster of vacationers neck deep, rolling in pre-wave relaxation. Instantly Sea Isle was mine again. I held my dad's hand, shaking with excitment and fear as he showed me the ocean beyond foamy, forceful of waves. He showed no fear of the ocean even though he didn't know how to swim...he could float and believed that's all he needed to know. He mocked me until I trudged out past the shell covered bottom to the satin under my feet and the calm beyond. He floated completely relaxed and I paniced as the current pulled us away from the lifeguard tower. But we were safe. We always stole those peaceful moments in the sea. The world didn't exist out here. Free from everything solid and firm and bound and staid. We bobbed with the sea, saw dolphins, and sometimes a fish that the sea gulls would attempt to have for lunch. The boats were more than specks on the horizon and the sounds of people vanished in roar of the sea.
I thought about finding the strength to bring Anya out here when she's old enough. I want Anya to understand the sea and its peace and beauty. Then I wonder if there will be a sea that's safe to swim in by the time she's old enough; I'm clouded by oil spills and trash dumping and melting ice caps. I say a little prayer to the gods of the deep to fight off the human disease. How could humans destroy something so pure? We are the cancer of the earth. I turn around and catch Anya, playing at the water line with her daddy, and the voices of the vacationers are audible again, snapping me out of my nightmare.
I watch her giggling and digging in the wet sand with her daddy, and again think back to our annual vacations here in Sea Isle. I remember having dinner as a family: me, Erica, Chrissy, and Connie, my parents and dad's parents, all filling the dining room and kitchen island in my godparent's beachhouse after our outdoor showers...you know you can't bring sand into the house...and fighting off those nasty green heads with soapy hands. We couldn't wait to gulp down the food and head out to the boardwalk. It was so routine, but we never caught on to it.
The Sea Isle boardwalk might have been Disneyland to this wild-eyed child. We hurried through dinner with the promise of the amusement park, mini golf, and skee ball...don't forget the ice cream. Every night my dad marched us hand in hand the 2 blocks to the boards, and we would play the night away. He played the dart and toss games and won us the life-sized stuffed animals, and bought us cotton candy against our mother's pleas. We rode the ferris wheel and tea cups and thrashed through funland. Other nights we parked in the arcade for a marathon skee ball adventure, saving our tickets each day to turn in for awesome junk at the end of our vacation. My dad lined us up and encouraged us to keep trying...and cheered when we hit anything above the gutter. We thought we had a million tickets at the end of each season...we couldn't wait to cash them in and took dibs on what we would trade for this year. And still other nights capped off time on the greens, or astro turf more applicably. Sister against sister and daughter against father we meandered through the course with the concentration of the US Open. We always held our breath at the last hole to see which one of us scored the whole in one that night.
Our days at the beach seem to be most memorable and accessible to me. I never realized how in tune I was to the beach and ocean and how strong those memories really are. I know that I need to find a way to bring them back to my life, and into Anya's. I have too many memories still scrolling across my mind. I can't even pick another to step into for a time. So I stepped out of the breaking waves back to Anya and daddy and into their little world of clams and receeding water.
We covered Anya up a bit and Rich took her for a walk on his shoulders from one guard tower to the next. I watched them disappear from sight and faded into anther moment in time...to the early morning walks on the beach with my grandmother and father. Every morning after our bike ride or roller skate or walk from one end of the boardwalk to the other, my grandmother and father would pack us kids up and stroll down to the beach for some quieter play in the sand. This was not swimming time, this was adventure time. My dad took us older girls, while the younder ones built castles with yiayia, to the jetties and showed us the tide pools and all the sea creatures that lived in this bizzare habitat. We collected sea shells and star fish and sponges and spent hours of adventures playing around the jetties. We would trek home afterwards tired and full of dreams and napped until lunch and round two. Rich brough Anya up to the blanket sound asleep slumped over his shoulders, exhausted from her first day at the beach.
After a nap under the umbrella we cleaned up and set off for the house for showers, dinner and the car ride home. Maybe we were all tired. Maybe the sun was too much. Maybe we thought we had too much fun and a balance needed to be maintained. Maybe the devil came for his part of the deal. But no more than five minutes into the ride home all hell broke loose. I'm not doing it. I'm just not going to be accused of the rage that I didn't ellicit. I'm not going to accept blame for someone else's tabtrum. I'm tired of being blamed and accused and yelled at and defeated and beaten to a pulp. I'm emotionally spent. I need him to take responsibility for his emotions and behavior and words and to be a man not a man-child. I need to him to show respect and thoughfulness. I need for him to think on his own, jesus fucking christ, just once....please. The rage and victim mentality cannot continue. He's becoming his father I think, and it scares me. I'm running out of excuses and strength. I don't even know what the right course is. I have nightmares now about the last brick falling, and it hurts too much. But I don't know if there is enough mortor for repairs. How do you turn something so beautiful into something too horrid to comprehend?
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