Return to the Ocean

My parents may be in a position to refute this, but I feel I have been in love with the water since I was a small child. After getting my first taste of the ocean in first grade, I have always loved visiting the shore. Growing up in the Midwest, trips to the ocean were few and far between - neighborhood pools and the family homestead lake were more familiar - but a move to Maryland brought day outings to Bethany Beach and Ocean City and my first taste of sand (literally) as I tried to dive beneath a wave.

I suppose I should clarify. I do love the ocean, but I love the ocean when it's active. I love the wind whipping up waves onto the shore. I love the pull of the tide, the water gripping around my ankles. I love drying off in the sun after my lips have puckered from too much salt and my skin is battered red from sand.

One of the unexpected joys of living in eastern NC has been the close proximity of the beach. The North Carolina coast is extremely varied; at some points the shore runs almost perfectly east-west while others - i.e. aptly named Surf City - run at a perfect 45° angle, creating awesome opportunities for surfing.

Or, in my case, body-surfing.

In years past James and I have been able to go to the beach as early as mid-April. This year, the funky weather patterns had us waiting until the big summer kick-off weekend; this past Sunday we headed down with untold others to enjoy Sunday at the beach.

After lathering up with sunscreen (which, of course, was not enough, never is), I laid out with my newest edition of The Sun, soaking up some sun before heading out into the delightfully large waves (thank you, tropical depression!), and found myself immediately enthralled with Ariane Conrad's interview of Ran Ortner.

©Ran Ortner, Deep Water No. 1

Beautiful. Incredible. Stunning, especially when you consider this particular painting is twenty-four feet long and six feet tall.

This gave me a better perspective.

The full interview is not yet available online, so I'll share some pieces I found truly moving.

"People often describe themselves as either a mountain person or an ocean person. I grew up in Alaska with both: mountains coming right down to the water.

In a sense, the mountains and oceans are similar. They mountains heave up with the collision of tectonic plates and then erode down, just as the waves rise up and then crumble. They just operate on different timelines. What I respond to in the ocean is that the waves break in synchronicity with the beating of my heart, the in and out of my breath. The ocean feels like a better subject for me to wrestle with.

In the ocean I see the collision of life and death: the rising of each weave is life insisting on itself, and in the trough I see death. These high points and low points are all part of the larger dance. You really feel the lament of the ocean, and at the same moment there's a generosity, because the waves keep coming. These forces are working back and forth endlessly.

[...]

There are tempests and dark depths. You do not mess with the ocean. It will pummel you and chew you up. It is devastatingly brutal. And yet it can be luminous and delicate and tender. We clean our wounds there. What a reflection of our own impossible nature. We're so brutal, so base, so horrific, and yet we have the capacity for such tenderness, such warmth, such empathy, such generosity."

Dodging Rain

These are the clouds that have been rolling across the sandflats for the past week. And in the belly of these clouds are rogue storms that gleefully dump rain, steam up windows, and make for altogether confusing days - is it going to be hot? chilly? rainy? sunny?

Today I drove home with the sole intention of beating the next big storm. And I did. I ran in the steambath, dodging the random droplets.

I really noticed today how landscaping and foliage changes the air. Running past the homes in my neighborhood showcasing tightly trimmed lawns and modest boxwoods I burst through pockets of cool air that tumbled down from the clouds. Homes whose yards are ruled by old growth trees and azaleas their blanket of needles, half rotted leaves and other detritus practically belch out clouds of their own - rich with the smell of earth, heavy with the smell of stored rain, and as warm as a human breath.

Sun-Eyed Girl

James calls this my "summer song."

It's the one that I inevitably want to play when we're almost to the beach because I played it the first time we visited the North Carolina coast five years ago - I zoomed down the windows to let in the briny air, turned up the radio, and bounced in my seat like the five year old I was at that moment.

I also, until this moment, always thought the lyrics were "summer girl" - happily, I like the corrected version even better.

While we've been hanging about in rainforest-like conditions all week, summer is almost here and the beach - bodysurfing, frisbeeing, and squinting into forever - is beckoning.

Friday.

It's another one of those days when the blue skies of North Carolina seem endless. To make it even better - the air is dry, the temperatures are down, and it's FRIDAY, baby.

I am savoring every run I get in this unseasonably cool May; each one I pretend is my last (we did get our first heat wave last week, complete with full humidity) and I can feel myself smiling as I run.

Nothing too fancy this week; just a couple of The Usuals with James bookending a midweek vinyasa yoga class. With the cool, dry weather spilling into the weekend, I think I've got James talked into returning to Umstead for our first trail run of 2012 on Sunday. Can't. Wait.

Oh! Well, hello there.

I realize that posting today means that I haven't posted in three weeks.

And it's not because I haven't been running. Or am lacking things to write about. It's more that I'm...going through a drought, a drought of creative juices.

I had an awesome run with my sister Emily the Saturday after the RunRaleigh half. She took me to the Monarch Levee Trail on a sunny, breezy, chilly Saturday. We talked about her plans to run the Disney World Marathon on January 13, 2013 (!) - rock on, lady!

The heat finally turned on in Goldsboro this past week, and James was ever so kind to slow down to run with me while I re-baptized myself in the heavy summer humidity of Eastern NC.  He spliced an extra couple of miles into The Usual run, making our 4 miles a 10K.

And today's long run with James and David was just what I needed after staffing a booth for work handing out popsicles on a 90° day.  It was cloudy and cooler, but humid and windy, and after a slow start, I hung pretty well with the boys on this 11-miler.

With no races scheduled in my immediate future, I think I'm going to try and focus on some rigorous cross-training as we are flung into summer. Some yoga, most definitely; some cycling, possibly?

Here's to the summer!