Autumn Time and the Living is Easy

Photo by Mikaela

Can you say a la playa? This past weekend my friends and I hit up the beach hard. With no Spanish classes, we spent our days soaking up the rays, catching some waves, playing beach volleyball with some locals, and snorkeling. It was so totally radical, dude.

I have actually always written snorkeling off as a lowly toursity thing to do, however after this weekend I am completely humbled - I had an absolute blast. The entire time I felt as though I was a visitor on another planet. I still have trouble believing that this other world has existed all this time, right in front of me and I have only just discovered it. Spending my summers in Maine, I've been really lucky to spend so much time in and on the ocean, but I've never before been bothered to explore what's under it.

What stood out to me most was the serenity of it all. The way the retracted sunlight danced on the ocean floor. The cool lick of salt water on skin. The vibrant colors. And the silence. The silence that sung so loud, it was all I noticed. The silence only interrupted by my steady breathing that filled my ears.

I am not sure if I have ever, in all my life, been more aware of myself in its existance. My own body, my own thoughts. Looking back, I believe what causes that self-awareness are moments like these, when we are so out of our element, so immersed in the wild, in our natural state, that the only thing we can do is to look within and know ourselves.