Beach Leftovers: Second Breakfast

For those of you who are fans of Lord of the Rings, I don’t have to explain the concept of Second Breakfast. But allow me to fill the rest of you in. Second Breakfast comes after regular breakfast but before lunch. I’m quite a fan of the concept sometimes.

This post is my second breakfast to the first post I shared with you about my recent vacation to the east coast for a beach vacation. Here’s Part 2: Vacation Ends. Yet another one I’m just now typing up and adding to a few weeks after entry into my paper journal.

I did it. I just went on vacation. Like a normal, good-ole fashioned American. There and back again for one week only with no expense spared. Now, on my last night here, I find myself on the balcony overlooking the water, the sunset glinting off the diamond-crusted waves, and I find myself so desperately sad at the thought of returning home.

I love my “vacation self.” The side of me that doesn’t complain constantly about everything – my job, my city, my finances, my place in life. The side of me that tries something new, that does something brave, that sleeps in and actually finishes my tea before I run out the door to the next activity. I love that self. She’s such a great, happy, smiling (and tan!) person.

I cultivate my quiet self out here, among the waves – or rather, beside them. I’ve never been a person who likes to swim in the ocean that much. The combination of stinging, smelly saltwater and unknown creatures all around me with the scouring cruelty of sand has never exactly been my idea of a fantastical getaway.

But I fall more in love with myself out here, away from it all. I see the quiet within that doesn’t feel the need to hog the spotlight, to cry out for attention or seclude myself away because the only quiet I can find is in my home.

But how do I maintain my “vacation self?” Is it possible or is it just an illusion? That Lauren just feels so expansive, so infinite, so limitless, so free. I wish I could be her all the time.

That wish is the first step for change. Not for an escape. Not for a getaway plan, but I am now determined to find a path that suits me good and proper. A path where I don’t have to stuff everything I like about myself into a hidden corner of my personality so that I can function on a daily basis.

It’s another one of those Great Perhapses. Another risk I’ll have to take. Here’s to the future of the uncertain unknowns.

Beach Leftovers

So I know vacation was two weeks ago now, but there’s just something about it that sticks with me. Maybe it’s the sand. Ya. It’s probably the sand that’s still stuck in the creases of my backpack and (I swear!) in my pores.

I’m one of those old-fashioned human beings that still likes to write (with a pen AND paper!) in this thing called a journal and then upload it later onto this new-fangled thing some people like to call the internet. Below is one of those instances where I’m just now getting to something I wrote weeks ago. I know, WEEKS AGO!! In this world of instantaneous uploads, how could I?!

Without further ado, I wrote this while sitting on a deck overlooking the beach as the sun waned in North Carolina. Let’s think of this as another Word Photograph:

The sea foam washes my toes at high tide. Frothy milk edges with a sprinkle of sand cinnamon. A saltwater chai tea latte for me to scoop up and wash down. The foaming bubbles catch between my toes, trying to hide from their inevitable fate as the shore gulps them down. Pop pop pop! So gentle none but themselves hear as they vanish into oblivion. A quiet, whispering, moaning release lost in the cacophonous symphony of sound that are the bellowing waves of trumpets and tubas and the smashing, humming of drums that rumble so deeply your stomach shakes. All around me are sounds, far louder than any city street but more soothing than a mother’s lullaby in your cradle before you know how harsh the world can be. Just a gentle swish swish and away they are whisked again-a brief lull before the next crescendo. Before the milk froths again for your afternoon saltwater coffee break.

The world glitters colors – thousands of colors reflecting all the particles of the universe. The sand refracts a thousand colors of glass yet to be formed. Crabs so big you want to reach for a plate and a steam bucket glow blue from their shells as they scuttle nervously against the current, scuttling madly from shelter to shelter. Shrimp holes bubble in the sand, a seafood platter just waiting to be washed. Pelicans float across the sky as seagulls madly dance and screech, screaming for attention and the scraps from tourists, whose trash fills the sea in careless tossings. Shells reflect the light of a thousand origins – orange ruffles, potato crisp ridges, black oyster holders, rocky fragments, shell-like glimpses. An entire world of sight and sound. Then a hush falls over the crowd. A split-second pause, only for your ears.