November 21, 2020

Two days, two beaches, one naked swim.

It all started because of my finger injury with the hatchet. I couldn’t swim, but the water called. With a beach walk I could continue my quest for more moon snail shells and fragments, and delight in watching my mutt scamper with unbridled joy at the beach.

Overwhelming sadness and grief took me hostage yesterday like a suffocating blanket. I needed an out, I needed to be near the water if not in it. As my finger injury kept me out of the water, the beach would have to suffice.

The first beach was Crystal Springs yesterday, just Rocky and me. Together we explored the quiet beach and found dozens of fragments of moon snail shells, while the sun sank low and the waves brushed the shore. Ducks hunkered down onshore, or nearby, bobbing on the waves, and scattered like leaves when Rocky caught sight of them and dashed into the water to watch them startle and take flight.

We strolled north, lightly trespassing over slick stones past houses lining the beach, hoping that our peaceful stroll wouldn’t upset the folks who see this view everyday. It dawned on me that this slight anxiety I felt down my spine would have been utterly absent had I been floating in this same water, just a few feet offshore.

I don’t understand the concept of “private” beaches, and find it repellant—but swimming one can float just over the “private” land and be left alone.

Dozens of times this summer and fall I swam just offshore of dozens of beachfront houses, and never once even considered that this was a trespass. But had I walked these beaches, sadly I am certain that at least some owners would not have been pleased.

Yet another way that the water makes me feel free. No one can own the saltwater.

We arrived home laden with shells, to be photographed and studied, fragments that hold stories of their own. I went to bed and slept hard and long, waking rested at nearly 11am.

Today was a lighter day. The sky made space for sun light, brightening my mood and lifting my spirits. We ate French toast and then sat together, with our sons, talking about the planet and the future and skateboards and electric cars and dictators and prisons and melting polar ice caps.

Later on, amidst cleaning out our closet I found some poems I had written on motherhood, and raising sons, reflections on living.

I read one to Aidan. The next one was not so light, and he asked me if it was dark, and if it would make him want to wrap me in a big blanket and hold me. And I said yes, and he said let’s skip that poem. And then he wrapped his arms around me to give me a giant hug. My heart burst into a thousand pieces.

And then evening came and I felt restless, and strapped on my shoes and announced I was going for a run. This would have been my third run in three years, but it was cut short by my desire to just walk, take a sharp right and go the beach.

The darkness was closing in fast, and I arrived at the landing at dusk. The rocks shown black and shiny, and I veered right, another light trespass to walk in near darkness the length of the spit. Shore birds swooped and cried, sounding the alarm, likely drawing me away from their hidden nests. I stayed low at the waters edge, looking down at the same rocks I have passed over many times during higher tides, wrapped in my saltwater blankets. Two moon snail shells found my hands, more hidden stories to be told, if I could uncover them.

The moon was out, glowing from behind dark clouds as I returned to the landing. All was still. I had the beach and the moon and the water to myself. Maybe just a brief dip wouldn’t do much harm to my finger. And maybe a swimsuit wasn’t necessary.

At the rock wall, after a quick glance around, I ran a mental checklist of my available clothing needed to get home, and after considering perceived and actual risks with a quick skin swim in the purest sense of the word, I committed.

I hurriedly shed my land layers and tiptoed over the wet rocks and shells, walking straight away into the cold water up to my waist.

And there I stood.

Adrenaline is a powerful thing, and as I had experienced just the other day with my first November skin swim (in a suit), the cold was present but more of a side note to the experience.

I felt like a mermaid for a moment.

Again I felt giddy with delight at standing alone, completely free of any physical restraints. I looked around, at the water and the sky and the moon, joining this other world again—and then spotted just a few meters away a black form, like a bowl turned upside down in the water. The shape was there then gone, and my eyes or imagination or the merging of the two watched a dark wave become another dark wave and another, headed straight for me.

I stood stock still. What was I seeing? Was I dreaming? Was it a seal or my desire to see one?

Fear was not in me. I was okay. I know this place. I looked down towards my feet at grey and black and brown rocks sitting still around me. No sign of movement there.

And then a splash to my left, a little ways away.

I was not alone. I dove under, and swam breast stroke in a circle. The cold surprised my body where I usually have a thick layer of neoprene.

I swam to the shallows, and turned once more, swimming freestyle out a few yards, my toes tingling. The unique feel of Raynaud’s—my old friend. Time to get out. I wanted this to go well. This was worth repeating.

Back on shore I crept cautiously and quickly like a stealthy raccoon back to my cache of clothing, and using my shirt as a towel dried off and whipped on my clothes in record time.

I looked back at the water, and again in the near darkness could just make out the shape of a round head floating low in the black water. With my headlamp I aimed it at the water, hoping to to clarify what I was gazing at, but the light did not reach.

The darkness and waves swallowed up my friend, and whether real or imagined, the effect was the same. I was not alone.

With a burst of energy and heightened alertness, I clutched my shells in one hand and my headlamp in the other and started running home. Half way home I realized I had left my red shirt at the beach.

Perhaps I’ll go back tomorrow and try to find it. My sons were slightly aghast that their own mother would do such a thing. Swim naked from a public beach.

But it was dark, I explained. No one could see me. And I was all alone.

Or was I?