“Like Willie Dixon said, ‘God, I need someplace to clear my head.’” — Tom Cochrane
I have this thing I do, when at the beach, for years now. Not always, but often. It is a ritual. It’s a thing, yes.
So I say to the old dude (the even-older-than-me dude, that is), him in his khaki ball cap, his khaki everything, really, who’s just then collecting shells, or at least shambling about and staring down at the sand in concentration, as I walk up beside him down there near the water, preparing, as I do, for the dumb moments to come:
“Don’t wanna startle you, so you should know that me and my lousy hips are about to run screaming into the ocean, until I suddenly fall down.”
At first there he says nothing. He looks me up and down. And then:
“Well, good luck to ya.”
I mean, what the hell else is there to say?
“Oh,” I respond, “it won’t go well. It never does.”
And as before, as surely again, indeed it does not. It didn’t. It won’t.
“Aieeeeeee!” Flail, flail, flail … fall. That sudden shock of frigid water. I’m down. Oh, yeah, campers, I’m down. But am I staying down? I’m not staying, at least not this time. There are perhaps more oceans ahead. More screaming, surely. More flailing. More falling.
Hallelujah, I suppose.
And anyway, my knees. As in fuck my lousy hips. Cuz my knees are now skint all up. The sand. Ouch.
Resurfacing, badly, I lumber back to my feet, a lone figure above the froth, a whale of a guy washed out so close to shore. I am turning then to wave to the older fella, who was no doubt watching this idiocy unfold before him, from my tenuous spot out there in the foamy drink. Damn if he didn’t wave back.
I will likely see my job, already only part-time, phased out entirely all too soon. This became apparent to me only today, while on vacation, just a few weeks shy of my turning 60. Again, not yet ready to quit. But, come on, honesty here: Who gets hired for something new at 60?
There may be trickier times ahead.
But there is always this, y’know? Some vast and swirling ocean, some tempestuous crashing of unfiltered life, of brine and simply being, to vault your screaming ass into, to remind you ever again of what’s important. Of what’s ultimately what.
As in it’s cold out there, folks. It’s cold, and we all do fall down sometimes. We all fall down. Yet things may get a little warmer. They have before; might as well plan that they might again. Because what else, I suppose?
There is nothing to gain in what else.
So on again you go, right? On again you go.
