I park the car slightly off the road. Far enough back that no one will see I am not a local, but close enough that I don’t have to walk too far in the summer heat, which is radiating through the tinted windows. My heart is thumping, the nerves, and I sit for a moment and turn up the classical music on the radio. Max Richter’s recomposed ‘Spring’ from Vivaldi’s four seasons fills my ear, and for a moment, my mind wanders off from what is coming. I start thinking about the music, and despite the fact I’ve heard this piece hundreds of times, I wonder if I really like it at all. The violins are too high pitched, and what gives him the right to think he can recompose the music of a genius? My heart, which had been given a temporary rest with the music, starts to thump again, but once again with a feeling of anger. I open the car door which immediately turns off the radio and lets some air in. I’ve had enough of feeling angry today, and this is why I am here, once again, back to this place that I haven’t been in years.
I stand in the gravel, grab my newly purchased thongs, and throw them on the ground. One hand on the car as I kick off my sneakers and put them on. As my feet slide into the cool rubber and the strap inserts itself to separate my big toe from the rest, I wonder why people even wear these things. Uncomfortable and completely impractical – I can already feel the gravel sliding between the thong and the soles of my feet. The soreness of the rubber on my skin, wedged in the gap of my big toe. I take my bag out the car, fumble with the zip as I open it to look inside, do I have everything I need? Am I ready for this? I look down the road I feel I had walked a thousand times and get a glimpse of her. Her smell fills my nostrils and already, I am feeling overwhelmed. How do you greet an old friend who you went to for comfort, asked the most demanding, and sometimes sinister things of – who you then abandoned for over 25 years?
As I walk towards her, the sound of my thongs flip, flopping on the road become overpowered by her sound. Her scent becomes stronger, and she becomes bigger and realer in my vision. Walking down this road towards her brings back a flood of memories, overwhelming memories. Riding my many horses along here, sneaking out with my friends to drink and smoke underage in a desperate attempt to be popular, my first sexual awakening – making out with a boy older than me in the back seat of his car. Then there are memories too dangerous to go near. I feel them all flooding back, and I know they are coming for me.
As I edge closer, I wonder, does she know it is me, does she know I am here. She knows so many people and is loved by so many. After all these years, perhaps she won’t even know who I am? I am so close now, there is no turning back. I make my first step onto the searing sand, instantly kick off my thongs, pick them up and throw them into my bag. I lift my head and look directly at her. The sun glints off her, almost blinding me, and I feel she recognises me once more. The fear and overwhelm turn into a feeling of being home, somewhere I have diligently avoided for so many years. Once again, her body looks so inviting, although like me, she has changed. She is further up the sand now, both of us eroding, ageing in our own ways. Her breakwaters, like my bones, now covered with a substantial amount of sand. But there is still so much familiarity. The boat ramp a short way up the beach at the private boys college, still finds its way into her. How many hours I would spend watching the fit and rich city boys visit her and learn to sail, their firm bodies learning how to read her. Always feeling out of my league, I would pretend to read, stealing glances when I felt brave.
I look down and see my rock is still there, the one I would spend night after night sitting on. Hardly changed after all these years – jet black, with a slight shimmer to it. I put my bag down, so it rests on the rock and look down the beach. Just one breakwater away, local families are enjoying the summer sun. I see faces I recognise – the local policeman and his now grown son, the pharmacist and, florist. The pharmacist sees me and waves, and I wave back, feeling grateful and relieved that I have been recognised, and no longer a local, welcome to be at this place when I need it the most.
I take off my dress – my two-piece swimwear clinging to my large, curvy body – and throw it over my rock. As I adjust the bikini top to ensure my large breasts don’t topple out the minute I hit the water, I wonder why I chose to wear it, instead of a one piece. But then I remember how at times, I would swim in nothing at all, her cool feeling touching my skin, and instantly crave it once again. I start to walk towards her, as she laps on the shore. I see the wall of seaweed that go out into her for a metre or so, common in a high tide. I remember how much I hate the feeling of it on my legs – like the arms of slimy aliens trying to pull me under. A childhood fear I still haven’t gotten over. I walk to where the seaweed begins to thin out, slide my swimming googles over my eyes and run, jumping over it and diving into her.
The instant my body collides with her, I feel relieved. The sudden coolness enveloping me, the taste of salt. I dive down, down until my fingers touch the sand slowly and kick, kick, kick. I feel once again like a mermaid, free, wild, nothing but her beautiful teal colour in front of me, the beams of sunlight shining through the surface. Slightly opaque with the unsettled sand from the tide coming in, but still the sea I remember, the her I remember. My head finally pops above the surface, and I gasp for breath. A combination of the survival instinct, my body being plunged from warmth to coolness and the time submerged. I feel the saltwater dripping from my hair, cool down my back, the wind over her surface chilling me slightly, the hot day almost forgotten with this refreshing feeling. I begin to swim further out to sea, just deep enough so I can no longer feel the sand under my feet.
As I sit there and tread water, I look over to the mainland and French Island. I think back to the nights I would sit in the dark and watch the flashing navigation lights and dream of a life on the mainland. I would imagine myself as someone happy, with a loving partner and children. As my thoughts drift into the fantasy of my youth, I think to my own loving husband, and two beautiful children – 600 kilometres away at home, and yearn to share this moment and scene with them. I feel the waves buoying me along in the current, and I promise her that I will bring them to her. When the visit is not about facing my demons – helping the sick mother I no longer love, but am duty bound to assist. I will bring them to meet you dear sea when I am visiting to celebrate my Island home. Her waves caress me, and I feel they are thanking me, but also are stronger than I remember, a slight scolding from her.
I continue to swim a bit further out to try and find the sandbar that would always be just past the deepest water. I keep feeling for the sand with my toes and watching for the slightly breaking waves, and I find it. I can stand ever so slightly, reminding myself that there is sea grass present on this sandbar, and not to panic when I feel the ticklish little green tentacles touch my feet. I feel a sense of joy finding the sandbar, a feeling I haven’t lost that connection with her, and like an old lover, I still remember her intricacies, her beauty and secrets not hidden from me.
I decide to make my way back to the shore and the end of her embrace. As I kick off from the sandbar, I hold myself under her, silent, waiting for the feeling of my lungs being squeezed, desperate for air. The feeling of overwhelm coming over me, holding myself under a few seconds longer than I should – but instead of hoping, like I did so many years ago, in the dark nights, under the moonlight, that I would not resurface, I apologise. I apologise for the sinister wishes I once made and thank her for never taking me, for always giving me breath again, and strength. The strength to go on and survive another day in a house full of discomfort, another day of endless loneliness, to dream of the future, to dream of the sky, to dream of my people, and to make those dreams a reality. I swim back in slowly, riding her beautiful waves, feeling her tell me that she forgives the sinister pleas of a distressed teenager. I still cannot leave her yet, and stay in the shallows, knowing once I leave her, I will return to my home so far away and knowing that seeing her again will happen, and it won’t take years for me to brave her.
I emerge from her cleansed, reinvigorated. Her salt clinging to my body, slightly crunchy to the touch. My hair curling in tousled waves, like her waves, almost as if she has passed on her magic once again to my soul. I sit on my rock as I did as a teen and look out to her as the sunset changes the sky and the reflections on her surface. As I sit there, those hidden thoughts come flooding back to me. I face them with courage, and not a sense of foreboding. She has given me this courage in her salty kiss. I remember the days I would ride my horse into her, splashing about playfully, the summers spent with friends, bright pink zinc on our noses, making sandcastles and the nights where I didn’t want to face the mornings, sitting lonely, a child unloved in a house full of abuse. Those nights, where she would be illuminated by the moonlight, I would eventually submerge myself, surrendering to something so much stronger than I. These long-hidden feelings I let wash over me, as she has done, and I allow each one a moment in my thoughts. Just a moment. That is all. And once again, I feel her scent fill my nostrils, the smell of sea, and salt, giving me the strength and courage to embrace and honour those past feelings. Those feelings, once of complete danger, and emptiness, replaced with safety, love and completeness. No longer sitting on my rock, wanting to escape, but wanting to stay, in her presence, thanking her for every lonely evening she was by my side. I stay on my rock, until the sun finally sets, and the reflection of a warm summer’s day is replaced with the rays of the moonlight. My face reflecting the light as does hers, and I say a quiet thank you before I leave, already longing to return.