Apparently I have forgot how to update my blog. I have been trying to stay off line a little bit more. But I do miss writing, if not about my kids, or my creative adventures, then maybe my emotional baggage.
…nah…
Sundays have become our go to cleansing day. Since school has started, my son in now in second grade, my daughter is just three and a terror half, and we have packed our schedule with dance classes and soccer on top of homework and science clubs. Now add in the stresses of basic military life stress, working early mornings, worrying about finances and job security even in a job where you are contracted for x-amount of years. You need a cleansing break.
What is more soothing than warm sand, crashing ocean waves, sky and water that stretch beyond conception of measurable space? For many summer has ended, but her in the low country it’s only starting to wain.Just because school is in and the tourists are out doesn’t mean the fun has to stop. Where in Alabama, we might part-take in some river fishing or light four-wheel riding, here the beach is our resource, and for now we are fortunate for that.
It is so easy for the kids to smile here. When my sons spends most days saying “it’s the worst-day-ever!”, or “I hate my life” its so nice to hear him say nothing. We can just watch him do. Watch him be happy. Our daughter doesn’t stop for anything, she is always having some sort of plan with digging holes or covering herself in sand. They are just kids. Kids without the pressure of perfection. Kids without the daunting task of cleaning their rooms, or reading their books, or just keeping it down so we can get some work done.
The beach has become a place where our little blurs of destruction can be just who they are and not hurt any one or anything.
The beach is somewhere where I don’t have to think about all the monotony of stupid little basic domestic roles I need to fill. I can breath and not worry about them spilling things on the floor, breaking this that and the other, and there for some reason, is nothing to fight about at the beach. I don’t have to referee infantile quarrels.
The beach is the only time I see my spouse not bring his phone with him, having his face up and looking at things around. He is using his hands for things like building and swimming and sometimes they are idle and he doesn’t seem to mind. The beach is where it’s easy for me to fall in love with him again because I can see him be himself, the self that may be lost in the roles of being a domineering dad, an exhausted employee, or a husband. Just being his own person.
It’s weird because, I am sure I am projecting. That I am reading into everyone’s emotional state a little too much but I swear there is a change, a change that is different all the other times we are out of the house.
We used to go to church and its like the beach is our church. It may not be our house of worship but it’s a house of cleansing from nature that is created by our God, outside the complexities of a gathered religion with mindless singing and reading. Maybe at the beach is where we feel closest to our deity.
I don’t know. I don’t care. For this day of the week I am free. We are free. And we are fortunate.
travelswithminis 