9.30.22

Three months before I moved out of Southern California, I stood in the Pacific Ocean at low tide, surrounded by sky and ocean grass. I moved my hand through the clear water and grass and felt the sun on my face. _______ was somewhere behind me, waving her orange surfboard around. I was anchored to time and place and I was on the precipice of something else to come. I'm going to do it, I thought, I'm going to begin the rest of everything. I got on my belly on the surfboard and paddled toward a wave. It carried me smoothly until I hopped off. 

Thank you, I said to it. Thank you for all you've given me and for saving my life. I'll never forget it. 

There was a sweetness to the ocean. The way I described it to _______was - juicy. Is there anything juicier than the ocean? No, was the answer. The ocean gave my life back to me. I wanted to live what was returned to me as best as I could. I didn't want to let it down; I believed in love again. 

When I finally moved to New York, old fears settled into me. Old friends, maybe. I dragged myself to the ocean once or twice. The Atlantic tasted different than the Pacific. I had finally arrived at the start of everything else, so why did everything feel like endings? I'm scared this confusion will last forever, even though the older I get, the more I know that to be untrue. I'm wishing for a love big enough to hold us all, bigger beyond what I could have imagined, like the ocean. 

Tonight, there is a bit of a chill in the air. There's maybe a sense that I've finally arrived.
I think I want to be happy; I think I'll choose to be even if I don't understand it yet.