Magical Moments

Ok. I managed to get through today’s swim without injury (unlike Friday). It was yet another great swim and Barbara joined me again for the northern leg.

I got up at 6:00, which gave me a near eight contiguous hours of sleep. That does not happen nearly enough. I average closer to 6. Yesterday I was with my son all day and it was one of those days where I just knew he needed a nap but I couldn’t get him to actually go to sleep, which is actually unusual. I’m wondering if it is me that needs the nap more than he does. God knows I needed a nap. Of course 2 minutes after getting him in the car to return to my ex-wife’s house, he is completely out.

Once it is fully light out, it looks as though the sky is completely covered in clouds. My phone says it is partly cloudy, but I’m pretty sure there is no “partly” about this. Later when I take my wonderful dog out for a walk, I can see these softly faint perforations in the clouds that give way to hints of blue sky above. There is hope! I’m wondering if this is just the beginning of our spring/summer morning marine layer season. Not a big fan. It does amuse me how I long for those summer months during the winter only to find the summer mornings to be so dreary.

I leave at about 8:20. I’m meeting up with Barbara at 8:30 who is joining me again for the first half of the swim. I’m looking forward to getting in the water. The buoys are up another degree this morning - 63. The warm weather and lack of strong northwest winds seems to be speeding up the arrival of Spring. And it feels like Winter never really fully settled in this year. It’s boxes are still mostly unpacked. Are we really going to make it to May with no extreme dip in water temps. Ok. I should just stop right here before I jinx anything.

I’m curious what the wave situation will be today. Thursday got pretty big last week and my Friday swim was a little adventurous on the swim back to shore as told in my last post. It is supposed to be smaller this morning but then build back up in the afternoon. I’m hoping all goes well with Barbara. Our last two swims have been so incredibly calm and she is not really a native ocean person EXCEPT her first swim attempt she did on her own in particularly large surf. Surf that I said “no thanks” to. There are tons of people who have lived here their whole lives that never go in the water because they are afraid of sharks or waves or God only knows what else is under that big vast huge ocean surface. I am so thankful to my Dad who brought me here every weekend of every summer and made this place such a fun place to be. However it can also freak me out from time to time.

That all said, serious beach injuries here are fairly rare. The latest big rescue here was about a week ago when someone decided to climb up the cliff and could not get themselves back down. Ok. I’m not fond of heights and can’t ever imagine myself doing that. That kind of just falls into the category of “not smart.” Sadly there have been times when someone who would be considered a true “waterman” has been fatally injured. A young man, about 2 or 3 years ago fell off his surfboard and hit his head on a rock and died. Something like that could happen to anyone. This particular person was a well known local surfer and body boarder who knew what he was doing.

Even my Friday incident could have been much worse if my body was angled differently or if there was a rock on the bottom. We just have to be careful but sometimes what feels like a good amount of care is not enough. My personal belief is that our moment of passing is planned out well in advance. I do believe these plans can be altered by free will but for the most part, we are going to die when we are meant to die. In the meantime I know I am meant to swim in the ocean and I am pretty careful. More careful than some, less than others.

So anyways I get to the parking lot and Barbara is already here and we are walking down the stairs and Barbara is noticing that the surf is indeed much larger than our last couple swims which were nearly lake-like. I’m looking and thinking it is bigger and maybe a little bigger than I was expecting but not so big to give me pause or hesitation. However I am a very impressionable person and as she is commenting on the “huge surf,” I am catching myself believing her. I know myself well enough to see what is happening here so I just plod forward.

Once we get a good look at the shore, another interesting development arises. There is basically no shore to look at. The tide is coming down from a 5.1 high that peaked an hour ago. I did not anticipate that it would cover the beach. Not too long ago, the highs were above 6 feet and there was still a modest amount of shore left. It’s all about the amount of sand on the beach and the latest large swell has taken quite a lot of it making the shore more susceptible to disappearing in the high tide. So we walk along this make shift (heavy emphasis on “make shift”) trail that runs above the boulders bordering the east end of the shore.

As we start on this trail, there are two other swimmers who look to be just finishing up. Barbara, being the observant person she is, notices they have wetsuits and fins and other gear. These guys look prepared and and she is commenting on this to them and they look at us and say “well…yeah…” in a tone that has a subtext of “no duh. We aren’t idiots.” I want to explain to them that, really, we have done this before and look, here we are. Of course conditions are a bit more extreme today and I am really hoping that I don’t end up being that whacko guy Barbara “met on the internet” and nearly costs her her life. Everything is fine. Everything is fine.

We stumble along the trail and soon scramble to our entry point. White water is rushing the boulders. I am questioning my life decisions made over the last 10 minutes. We start to move out into the water and swim past the surf pretty quickly and really without incident. And you know what? It’s freaking nice out here. The water, at least to me, is noticeably warmer than even Friday, which I thought was heavenly compared to Tuesday. It’s cool but feels pleasant. The funny thing is that I am sure it feels so pleasant in large part because of that 59 degree swim on Tuesday, otherwise I might be complaining.

The water is this very nice blue. Ok. It’s usually blue, but today feels special. There is a lightness to the water that lends it a sense of benign friendliness. It’s as if no bad could possibly happen here. I’m sure this is all in my head. I mean, of course it is all in my head - where else would it possibly be? I’m not sharing these thoughts with Barbara because I’m not sure how sound they are and now that I am writing them here, well…, they don’t seem sound at all. That all said, I still totally believe them and I stand by these words 100%.

We swim out a little past the bathrooms and back. I swam with her back to shore to make sure she made it back ok to that “trail.” She did. I then swam back out and went to the south end of the beach. I swam just a little shy of my normal turnaround spot. Larger waves are breaking in that area and I figure the extra swim to shore and back will cover my lost distance, because heaven forbid it should be any less.

This second half of the swim feels a little colder but still not bad, and the water still has that playful and loving demeanor it had in the firs half. I have these Christian worship songs playing in my head because somehow they feel like the right thing to be playing in this environment. Songs of God’s love and presence seem to naturally pour from this water. Yeah I know I still have to swim to shore through the waves again but it went fine just a half hour ago and why should now be any different? In fact the swim to shore seems extremely gentle. The tide has come down enough so I feel comfortable walking back to the stairs on the wet sand.

I get back home and check in with Barbara via text and she tells me she saw dolphins swimming with me as I swam back out. I had no clue. I know this has happened at least a few times before because people have told me and I’m sure it has actually happened countless times. I can’t help but wonder how this mirrors our lives. We walk along side of angels and forces we cannot see, hear or touch, but they are here nonetheless. We constantly enter in and out of these moments of magic and have no idea, but even though we have no idea, it does not mean that they are not happening or are any less magical.