That Thing

I leave just a little after 8:00 and the sky is cloudy and a bit more densely grey today. The marine layer seems to have a bit more staying power than the thin veneer of the last couple days.

I arrive at my parking space just as I am finishing my audio book on potty training and I’m not so sure I have ever been so happy for an audio book to be finished. These are not skills I had imagined myself needing to learn. I have been wrong about so many things and sadly that was another one of them.

I head on down to the beach and I guess the one thing that stands out the most to me is the lack of surf. I mean, it is a lazy sleepy day in the wave department. That’s fine by me. I like calm water until I am in up to my waist and there is nothing coming to force me to dive in. I eventually push myself forward, surrender to gravity and exhale under the water. It’s like sloughing off the skin of a past life and awaking to a whole new reality.

I’m swimming south and finding myself further inshore than usual. I find it interesting how my body just seems to naturally remain closer to shore on a calm day without any overt effort. What else would or could my body do if I just let it? I think I need to provide the agenda and construct a master plan and monitor every transition. I think that if I don’t then I’ll inevitably wander into some state of entropy.

I’m swimming out here on this stunningly beautiful calm morning and thinking of the upcoming transitions in my life. The ones I see on the horizon and the ones on the other side that are hidden by the curvature of the earth, but I know they are there. I become anxious that I’m going to make a wrong turn or screw it all up or, worst of all, entirely miss the transition and just languish here in a dead windless void.

I am swimming and watching a flock of pelicans intermixed with a couple gulls fly in from the west and head to the beach. I’m confused and perplexed by the thoughts floating in my mind as they respond to what I see coming my way. I don’t know what is expected of me or what to do or how to even order my thoughts around these oncoming vibrations. I decide to just settle my mind upon God or Jesus or love or whatever that thing is that I know is all around me and watching out for me. If I can just place as much of my attention as I can possibly muster on that thing then maybe that’s enough. I feel like it’s going to have to be because it’s all I can do. Also, that thing keeps telling me that it is.