For New Year’s Day, I had the good fortune to be by the ocean. There were hundreds of people around.
It does the heart good. Honestly, it does. While I prefer an empty beach, the people demonstrated how they’re not afraid of Covid and, by a more important extension, the government.

There were actually a couple of people masked. There are some outliers. But, most were sunning, playing in the sand, or attempting to do some sort of sand ping-pong. Some dressed in thongs that really shouldn’t be. People were being people.

A new year surrounded by humanity being lazy, greedy, and gluttonous. But, at least, they are rebellious.

For some reason, I couldn’t help recalling the first time I saw the ocean. I keyed in on the rebellious part.

It wasn’t the Atlantic, but the Pacific.
Up until that time, the largest body of water I’d ever seen was Lake Michigan and a small part of the Ligurian Sea. Neither of these gave me the impression of the Pacific. Being a Hoosier and growing up with amber waves of grain at every turn, the vast and apparently unending body of water could not be described with words.

The sound. The foam. The never-ending sky. It was something that movies just simply can not convey.

And I knew that I had touch it.

It was risky. The tide was coming in and my spine was fused just a couple of months before. I was on the mend and imagined I could feel the steel bar sliding around just under my skin. It was finding a place to settle by my spine, close to my heart, and west of my ribs. I knew I was lucky to be alive and even luckier to be able to even walk.

But, I didn’t care. The ocean was there. It was big. It was beautiful. I needed to make sure it was real and that I was, in a way, still here as well.

So, I took off my shoes and socks. I rolled up my pants to my knees the best I could. The ground was just so cold and wet beneath my toes. It was fantastic.

I strolled forward with a probably stupid grin on my face and promptly fell. Thunk and into the sand. It wasn’t so much headfirst but feet first as the sand and water combined beneath my feet.

The water was more gritty than I thought it would be. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t a full-body exfoliation. I guess that shows how much of a noob and inexperience I had with the ocean.

The thing is that I didn’t panic. It didn’t really occur to me that I could have drowned or have caused my spine serious injury. Oh no. Rather, I thought that I was going to become a mermaid. This is what was going to happen. Right then and right now. I was going to grow a fin, lose the legs, and head out never to see land again.

I was absolutely okay with that.
Although I all but failed any sort of swimming in gym class, I was going to become a mermaid. They didn’t have to learn how to swim. They were born into it. I always had a fascination with being a mermaid anyway. You see, I grew up in a time when baths were actually used for baths. Showers were rare. With a little Mr. Bubble, I could create seafoam and I was a mermaid.

The friend I was staying with, Elizabeth, grabbed hold of my shoulders and pulled me out. I’m not sure how she did, but she did. Elizabeth helped me to my feet and scolded me for about a good five minutes. I don’t remember what she said but her face was beet red. Her eyes flashed and she wasn’t smiling.

I reminded her that I was a child of the corn. I spent my years on a dead-end street surrounded by corn. This was really the first time I had been intimate with any type of saltwater.

She backed off and told me to put one leg out front. Place my weight on the back leg and grind my feet into the sand. It was a way to anchor myself so I wouldn’t fall in when a wave came in. I half-heartedly followed her directions.

It wasn’t because I thought I’d be a mermaid. I was over that bit of fantasy. No. I thought that the wave couldn’t make me fall again. I was just unprepared. Being a strong woman, there would be no way on God’s green earth a wave would knock me on my butt again. I was born under an Earth element. I would not fall. A bit of water, no matter from where or what would take me down.

But… yeah… I fell.
Again.

… I was baptized by the Pacific Ocean.

And, at least, I was smart enough not to try a third time. I wanted to, but Elizabeth would have let the waves take me at that point. I also had three more weeks in California to do stupid stuff. I didn’t want to mess that up.

Besides, when the time was right, I knew the foam would take me and my dreams would be realized.

It just wasn’t that day.