San Diego: A Trip to Remember, Part 4

I feel so Pirates of the Caribbean when I say this, but the ocean – y’all, it calls to me.

 

I know, right? But it does.

 

The smell – that salty, briny, fresh scent. The breeze coming off the water bring the most incredible smells that you just can’t find in any candle or spray. Freshness itself, in its purest form, untainted by chemicals and man. Free to all who breathe it in.

The site – the blue, the green, the grey. The contrast with the golden sand. White foam racing across clear, colored water. Pounding over rocks, crashing across land, leaping into the air and landing back down into itself.

 

The touch – cool or warm. Smooth. A little gritty when it mixes with the sand. The sand swallowing my feet whole while the water races back towards the big open blue. Tiny shells finding a home on the land, rocks cooled by the water, slick with growth and teeming with life.

The taste – OK fine, I don’t love the taste so much, but when I think about ocean water I think about the time in Hawaii that we saw a sea turtle and I dove, unthinking, into the water for the money shot. Suddenly I found myself choking on the saltiest thing I’d ever put in my mouth, sputtering and spitting and gagging it out. And while I don’t get excited thinking about that slight moment of panic, it’s yet another flavor that takes me back to my beloved ocean. I’ll take it!

 

The sound – I remember the last time we were in Hawaii a few years ago and I left the windows in our condo open all night every night just to fall asleep to the sound of the waves crashing. We fell asleep to the soundtrack of water hitting water every night we were there, something I never take for granted. Whenever we are near water I always make a point to sit close to it for the sound alone. The lapping, crashing, whooshing melody that engages and relaxes and pulls me in.

 

The ocean, y’all. It calls to me. And I am so glad that I was able to be near it a month ago in San Diego, traipsing through the foam and sand and salt and reveling in the beauty. It gets me. Every time. And what a gift!

Again, thanks to Bumble Bee Foods for the amazing trip – I had a blast!