For weeks past, the rhythm of the waves has been calling my name. It murmured approvingly when I found a new swimsuit in the Memorial Day sale. It echoed in the wind in the trees above my farmhouse fields as I tested out the bright red butterfly kite I planned to fly on the shore. It tumbled before me down the grocery aisles as I picked out seaside snacks to pack in my cooler. It laughed merrily when I pulled out a bookish beach towel that I have been waiting ages for an excuse to use.
But I’ll admit that, when my beach day finally arrived, and my alarm went off in the 5 a.m. dark of a summer Saturday morning, I was feeling too crabby to attend to the distant voice of the ocean. Some friends who had been planning to go had bailed. The forecast was cloudy. The long drive ahead of me was not appealing. The beach wasn’t sounding like such a good idea after all.
By 6:30 a.m., the smug satisfaction I had felt at enjoying an empty highway had worn off. I was regretting my decision to skip making coffee at home and get it once I arrived at the shore. I thought that all the people still sound asleep in their beds were the clever ones.
At 7:20 a.m., I got my first glimpse of the sea off in the distance and felt a thrill only a little dimmed by the prospect of figuring out parking.
At 7:26 a.m., I opened my car door, and the voice of the ocean caught me and called me, “Come, come, come!” - so insistently that it cast every other thought from my mind - luckily I remembered my keys and wallet but left my phone behind in my haste to get out on the sand and greet the sea.
By 8:00 a.m., sitting on the rocks with coffee and croissant in hand, communing with the seagulls and the moss and the barnacles and totally surrounded by the rhythm of the waves, I decided that, after all, there is no better idea than the beach.
There’s a Wordsworth poem that always springs to my mind at the beach…
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not. Great God! I’d rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.
Wordworth might have had pagan figures in mind, but I would say the great God Himself is a much more satisfactory and inspiring companion to have as you contemplate the restorative wonders of the shore. It’s easy to get out of tune, late and soon, out and about in the world, but the rhythm of the waves is God’s rhythm. It’s not a static, unchanging tone but a rise and fall, the winds howling and then sleeping, the juxtaposition of the dangerous strength of the rip current and the light-as-a-feather touch of rippling sheets of shimmering water reaching up the sand. I felt myself sinking into this rhythm as I enjoyed a long walk conversing with the thundering crash and the gossipy white foam as the waves came and went, as I explored Asbury Park’s boardwalk and tried some trendy pancakes and frozen strawberry-orange juice, as I played “Where’s Waldo” on the crowded beach to find my group.
My friends and I agreed that the ocean is just a healing place. The “wreathèd horn” sounds of sea are good for you (an aspiring apiarist in our group observed that bees also emit a similarly healing frequency when buzzing) and walking outside barefoot all day and connecting your feet to the earth, feeling the sand on your skin, is good for you.
I brought some books but didn’t end up reading them. There are too many other stories to read: not just Proteus rising from the sea but all the fellow beachgoers. As we were strolling on the boardwalk in the afternoon on a quest for crepes, we passed a little girl, happy and sleepy, half buried by the beach chairs and towels that shared a little wagon with her. “Happiness is being pulled by your dad in a buggy at the beach,” my friend said.
But we later talked about how it’s also a happiness to be able to take yourself off to the beach whenever you want as an adult. Happiness is also the older folks who were out early in the morning strolling on the sands. Happiness is also being the dad pulling the little girl in the buggy or the mom balancing two little ones in her arms waiting for her husband to come back with the ice cream cones. It was a delight to see so many different stages of life enjoying the day, all of us woven together by the sounds and rhythms of the waves.
Beach Trip to Asbury Park, NJ