Or maybe my preferences have just changed over the years? For whatever reason, I am now a summer person, and even more particular--a beach person. To me, there is no place more calm, more powerful, and more humbling than the beach.
My first trip to the beach was when I was around 10 years old. Our family went to Disneyworld and made a stop by the beach. This was the first time my brother, dad, and I had ever seen the ocean, and I remember thinking it was pretty cool. I mostly liked the seagulls, (thanks to Scuttle from the Little Mermaid), that were flocking around us. I remember watching my Dad, however, taking in the ocean for the first time and him just standing at the water's edge, the surf pooling around his big Dad-feet, in complete awe of the expanse of water before us and saying something about how small we really are. Shoot, I was just excited to see these feathery little seagulls waddling around me! I'm sure my brother and I soon asked our parents where the nearest pool was...
I do remember, though, the first time I was truly taken back by the ocean. It was the summer before my Senior year in college, and I was in Spain studying abroad. My new friends and I took an extended weekend trip to the Mediterranean island of Mallorca...
It was nightfall, and a friend and I wanted to go down to see the water. I distinctly remember standing there and finally getting what Dad was talking about those years ago. As I waded into the surf, I looked out at the water which mirrored the moon above. I felt the gentle, cool, yet humid thickness of the air around me; I smelled the strong saltiness. Everything was very calm yet humbling in the sense that I had just internalized how small and weak we all really are, and just how strong, powerful, peaceful, and artistic our God really is. I believe one of the many ways God reminds us of his love for us is through the things in nature. Those things that just catch and hold our attention for only a moment, and that many of us--especially me!--so frequently take for granted. And it's different for everyone. Maybe some of yours are snow-capped mountains great for skiing, or a green park, or the view from atop your deer stand, or a lightning storm, or maybe even a patch of bright purple wildflowers growing along the side of the highway. Mine? Certainly the one at the top is the beach. Maybe it's just the hopeless romantic in me, but when I visit the beach and have that moment where i just quietly stand there and take it all in, I feel God lovingly reminding me, "I made this for you and everyone because I love you and there's a whole lot more where this came from!" I also can't help but ask myself, "How can people see all of this perfection and power and think it happened at the hand of luck or chance or some sort of molecular collision?"
Am I getting too deep here for anyone??
Now don't get me wrong. That's not the only thing I think about when I visit the beach! I'm not forgetting about the sun warming your skin, the tanning (with SPF 30, of course!), the "beach reads," the trusty breeze that keeps me cool and from getting the dreaded sweat-stache, (too much information?), digging your toes into the cool sand, the tasty cold beach drinks, body boarding, parasailing, seashell hunting, napping!, people of all shapes and sizes wearing swimsuits of all shapes and sizes, and everything else in between. What are your favorite things about the beach, fellow beach-lovers??
So now that I have myself and all of you longing for "some beach...somewhere," I'm going to light my Bath & Body Works' Lime Margarita candle, slather on my Forever Sunshine hand lotion, and count the days until I am reunited with surf and sand!
And that is why the beach-ANY BEACH!-is one of my favorite things.
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