Whenever summer comes around, my mind always turns to the beach.
For me, some of my best childhood, teenage and adult memories have been made there. Whenever I go to one the stress of everyday life leaves my body and I’m just filled with peace and joy.
My love affair with beaches likely started early. In Prince Edward Island, where I was born, and where I lived for the first few years of my life, you’re never more than 20 minutes away from the ocean and consequently a beach. My mom would take me there in my little sun hat and let me splash around and build sandcastles.
However, I think it was moving to Alberta that really made me love the beach. It was there where my parents enrolled me in swimming lessons at the YMCA. Despite the taste of chlorine, the pool gave me the chance to learn how to swim without taking waves of salt water to the mouth, like my mom did as a girl.
Before long, and with my trusty swimming goggles on my face, I learned how to front stroke, backstroke, whip kick and breaststroke from one end of the pool to another. There is something so incredibly peaceful to me about just gliding along underwater.
There’s no sound under there; just you, your thoughts and your imagination. My family often compared me to a seal for my habit of gliding long distances underwater before sticking my head up for air.
When I would return to beaches on trips back home to PEI, I was able to put my newfound swimming skills to the test. Now, instead of a sterile pool floor and the occasional rogue bandaid floating by, there were fish, crabs and other living creatures to see.
To this day, exploring their environment is a delight. I always enjoy chasing fish and gliding through their schools, a terrestrial interloper in their aquatic domain.
Of course, I can’t swim all the time at the beach. Inevitably I’ll get too cold or pruney and have to leave the water to warm up.
As a child, my favourite activity was to build elaborate sandcastles — sand cities, really — just above the tidemark. Using hands and shovels I’d shape mighty walls, reinforce them with sea shells and then wait for the waves to crash against them. I’d take as much joy from their destruction as I did their creation.
Nowadays, I tend to bring a good book and plop myself down in a beanbag chair I’ve designated as a beach chair. Combining my love of reading with my love of the beach just makes for a sublime experience, if I do say so myself.
One day I intend to settle by a beach, in a warm climate, so I can go there whenever I want. In the meantime, though, it’s time for this beach bum to enjoy summer while it lasts.
SPLASH!
patrick.davies@100milefreepress.net
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