(no subject)
I want to go to the beach.
No, that's not right. This isn't a hm-well-I-guess-I-want. This is an I-want-and-want-and-want.
Ever since we left Virginia, I wanted. There were pros, yes, so many good reasons to leave. But I missed the beach.
And now we're back, sort of. Not as near as we used to be, but closer to the ocean than we were in Woodstock.
And I want to go to the beach. I want to drive there, bike there, walk there until my shoes fall apart and my socks tear and my feet bleed. I want to be there, want to be burned by the sand that gets in the worst places and never leaves, get poked by the little bits of shell that sting like a bitch but that you can never see.
I want to feel the sand under me, the firm sand that's closer to the beach, where you can see the holes, the only things to remind you of the creatures that live under the wet sand. I want to feel the sand under me, a little bit more than damp because the wave has just pulled back.
I want to feel the waves, icy or hot or warm or chilly, want to feel them on my skin. Want to lay down and let the water and sand fill my clothes, ruin them, cake my hair with sand and salt and wet. I want to lay there and feel every wave come and go, come and go, come and go.
I want to never lose the sound of the waves coming and going, the roar of the ocean and the thin sharp cries of sea gulls. I want to be splashed, submerged, soaked. I want to be swept away, want to lose control of my body, want to fall into the ocean and get knocked over by waves until I don't know which way is up, which way is air, and where my body parts are and where they should go.
I want to stay there, in the water, on the sand, until there is no difference between me and the ocean. And then I want to go into the water, first stepping and then wading and then swimming, until my feet can no longer touch bottom even if I dunk my head under. I want to stay that way, without my body touching anything but the water, want to feast on the smells and the tastes and the way it feels to have nothing to hold on to, to stand on, to tether me to reality or life or the world.
And after that, after I am swept away by waves that are loving and cruel in turn, after my eyes sting from the salt and my throat is raw from coughing and my skin burns from the sun and my muscles ache from treading water, after my senses can no longer tell the difference between my body and the ocean itself, this is what I want to happen.
I want to sink slowly down, and my hair will float and flow around my head, possessing properties that it never has above water, I want to open my eyes and open my mouth and breathe in the water, see the sea around me, feel my legs fuse together. My senses will change then, morph and mutate and be heightened, until I am not me anymore. But I am me, more me than I ever was, the most me I could ever be, under the sea, no longer human (was I ever human?) but a mermaid.
No, that's not right. This isn't a hm-well-I-guess-I-want. This is an I-want-and-want-and-want.
Ever since we left Virginia, I wanted. There were pros, yes, so many good reasons to leave. But I missed the beach.
And now we're back, sort of. Not as near as we used to be, but closer to the ocean than we were in Woodstock.
And I want to go to the beach. I want to drive there, bike there, walk there until my shoes fall apart and my socks tear and my feet bleed. I want to be there, want to be burned by the sand that gets in the worst places and never leaves, get poked by the little bits of shell that sting like a bitch but that you can never see.
I want to feel the sand under me, the firm sand that's closer to the beach, where you can see the holes, the only things to remind you of the creatures that live under the wet sand. I want to feel the sand under me, a little bit more than damp because the wave has just pulled back.
I want to feel the waves, icy or hot or warm or chilly, want to feel them on my skin. Want to lay down and let the water and sand fill my clothes, ruin them, cake my hair with sand and salt and wet. I want to lay there and feel every wave come and go, come and go, come and go.
I want to never lose the sound of the waves coming and going, the roar of the ocean and the thin sharp cries of sea gulls. I want to be splashed, submerged, soaked. I want to be swept away, want to lose control of my body, want to fall into the ocean and get knocked over by waves until I don't know which way is up, which way is air, and where my body parts are and where they should go.
I want to stay there, in the water, on the sand, until there is no difference between me and the ocean. And then I want to go into the water, first stepping and then wading and then swimming, until my feet can no longer touch bottom even if I dunk my head under. I want to stay that way, without my body touching anything but the water, want to feast on the smells and the tastes and the way it feels to have nothing to hold on to, to stand on, to tether me to reality or life or the world.
And after that, after I am swept away by waves that are loving and cruel in turn, after my eyes sting from the salt and my throat is raw from coughing and my skin burns from the sun and my muscles ache from treading water, after my senses can no longer tell the difference between my body and the ocean itself, this is what I want to happen.
I want to sink slowly down, and my hair will float and flow around my head, possessing properties that it never has above water, I want to open my eyes and open my mouth and breathe in the water, see the sea around me, feel my legs fuse together. My senses will change then, morph and mutate and be heightened, until I am not me anymore. But I am me, more me than I ever was, the most me I could ever be, under the sea, no longer human (was I ever human?) but a mermaid.