Today, I went for a walk along
the beach. I had not been for several weeks. In the summer there were too many
people there for my liking. Somehow, the whole place was taken away from me as
if squatters had moved in. I watched the trickle start in May and June, but it
was all fresh and new so it felt good to share it for a while. Then the car
parks filled and there was no space for my own thoughts down by the sea. The sun
threw its rays onto the surface and danced across the ripples and swells. I
wanted to chase the light and head off towards the horizon, away from the
splashing and shouting bodies. It was time to drift away, inland, with a fond
farewell to the vast, expansive sky.

Often, I stared from my window
towards the coast, imagining that nobody knew about my favourite spot.
Imagining that I could walk down there, right now, and it would be empty. I
would undress on the edge of the tide and slide into the cool water with the reflected
sunlight flashing into my eyes. Eventually, I thought, the day will come when
children in new school uniforms will be walking down the street and the crowds
will have gone.

At ten o’clock this morning, I
sat by the window again and looked out. The clouds, parted by the westerly
breeze, revealed the autumn sun and as my face warmed, I smiled. I finished my
mug of tea and slipped my keys into my jacket pocket as I closed the front door
behind me. The wind exhilarated me as I headed into it while the soothing heat
from the east enveloped my back. Inside, I saw myself to be as young as the
children I had watched go by a few hours ago.

Before long, my nostrils detected
the faint odour that can only be the smell of the sea. In the few paces it took
me to leave the conurbation behind, the noise morphed from the hum of car
engines to the crashing of waves on the shoreline. Stepping onto the pebbles
prompted the joyful sound of stone rubbing against stone as my progress became
more laboured. The straight line of the distant horizon drew me on until, at
last, the ebb tide appeared above the shingle bank ahead of me.

In the space beneath the clearing
sky, the September Sea looked so blue. The white clouds raced away against the
charging and churning breakers to reveal the glorious midday sun. A few yards
from the water’s edge, I turned through three hundred and sixty degrees and
found that I was alone. I was the only person here for this private viewing.
Even though, I knew, the cold wind and rain would inevitably follow, at that
moment I just wanted to renew my acquaintance with an old friend.