A calm, sandy beach with only the most delicate of waves. A dark land mass is seen on the horizon and above it, a blue sky with puffy white clouds. Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia.
We went to the beach at low tide.
It was summer, the one just past, and we were in Nova Scotia visiting family. Or, not visiting family. They caught the virus-that-must-not-be-named so we couldn’t see them until the end of our trip. Therefore: exploring.
A beach at low tide might be one of the top three places for exploration, in my opinion. Also up there: a really, really old - like really old - and cluttered antique shop. And a mother’s box of costume jewellery and trinkets when you’re a kid. And when you’re not a kid.
Do you like shells? Do you like stuffing your pockets with all the pretty shells and figuring out later how you will take them on the plane ride home because that’s a tomorrow problem? Do you like smoothing your fingertips over pebbles and finding one that has the perfect cove for your thumb? You’ve come to the right place.
As in-landers who generally have to content themselves with lazy lake shorelines that are tight-lipped with their secrets, the ocean is magic. (No hard feelings, lakes. You’re pretty great.) We spent a few hours in the roll of it: solo contemplation scanning feet-ward for treasures, dotted with exclamations of success and joy.
Crabs! An in-lander knows that ocean beaches have crabs but THERE THEY ACTUALLY ARE. And oysters in their shells (we think they’re oysters). Can you pick them up? While the others gently poked at them with driftwood, I found myself reaching down. What’s the worst a maybe-oyster could do to me, I thought, and it turned out to be not much. Spit some water, I guess. No big whoop, as we used to say and should definitely start saying again. We left with pockets heavy and hearts light; sometimes a cliché just gets it right, you know?
The past few years have been a low-tide scour. An unearthing of what hasn’t been seen or even sought after. An unoceaning, rather. Yes, I like that better. I don’t know what the moon has been up to but the ebbing has been vast and swift and in many ways very necessary, and with every drawing back of the wave, I’ve heard the question: Who am I now?
Who am I now?
Who am I now that we are all so sick, and sick of being sick?
Who am I now that racial violence is erupting, new and yet so very achingly old?
Who am I now that my children are teenagers and nearly-teenagers and eyeing the runway?
Who am I now as relationships unfold?
Who am I now as they fall away?
Who am I now in this body that is both failing and awakening in the same moment?
Who am I now in this moment?
And who am I now in this one?
And who am I now?
And who am I now?
Our collective ebb and my personal, customized-just-for-me-by-the-universe unoceaning have revealed both unexpected treasures and maybe-oyster-like curiosities requiring brave examination: And what are you? And what are you? And what are you?
And through these years of ebbing, I’ve wondered about the flow, and then pleaded with the flow, and then resolved myself to it never returning. But here it is and I want to write again and I have something to say. Nothing earth-shattering, I imagine, but there are words and they are only here because of that profound ebbing. We need to fall away to come together. We need to think before we speak.
I’m excited to share with you all the pretty shells I found and the weird things I got brave about, the sharp rocks I avoided and the ones that I couldn’t sidestep no matter how hard I tried.
I have been happy to make my reacquaintance and I’m happy to make yours, too. Thank you for flowing this way, either again or for the first time. If you’re new, I hope you like long-winded analogies.
And who are you in this moment? What has the unoceaning revealed to you? I’d love if you’d share below. I’ve missed you, kind of a lot.