My Place

Wind rustles. Birds gently caw. Waves rise and fall, exhale and inhale, pressing themselves to the sea shore...My bare feet are licked by dampness as dark, wet sand oozes between my toes. I wriggle them subconsciously, shifting the ground beneath me as I walk restlessly over the glassy film that's spread by the water, breaking it, shattering it into foaming peices.

I lift my head and breathe in the salt. Restless was the right word to choose. My thoughts bounce over the horizon as I stare unseeingly into its sunbathed midst. Beauty is there, but I choose not to see it, prefering the mysterious and unfathomable horizon of my future, gazing into its shapeless and undefined depths, a frown on my face.

The sea and sky seem to sympathise with me, the capricious clouds dappling the sea with unpredictable patterns. And the sea responds in turn, boiling and frothing with erratic currents and the impulsive winds that writhe over the water.

Cornwall at its turn in season is like a teenager: hormonal, eager and energized, alive with the prospect of what's to come. But, like a teenager, there is a sense of unbelonging. A generation lost to society, a sea lost to time...But as always, time will come. We will roll into life just as the sea rolls into winter, rolls into arching waves that loom and tower, spray that roars and flickers over the skyline.

I shove my hands into my pockets and continue the walk across the beach, choosing to linger in each footstep, imprinting my mark into the sand fruitlessly, knowing it will be washed away only moments later. How much of a mark do we make on life? How hard do we press?

Profound sparks of thought like that enter and leave my mind in the same instant, washed away by the torrent of nature which bombards my senses. Seagulls roar, the surf squeals, wind and water mingle against my skin, light shimmers, the cliffs moan...all this is the symphony of Cornwall. It's a tune I am so accustomed to that I almost hum along, knowing each bend and creak of the beach as I know the back of my hand, or the hairs on my head.

A smile flickers over my face and I repress the urge to laugh. My place is singing to me.

Gina x