Vacation: Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina

Before last week, I had never been "to the beach". That phrase implies the "experience", which I had never enjoyed until now. My buddy Clay and his family rented a beach house at Ocean Isle Beach and, several months ago, he invited me to join them for a few days. It was a short vacation but sweet. We had a blast.

Of course, I made a few observations about the ocean; some while there, some after I'd returned.

It is unnerving, the ocean. It is teeming with wildlife and I think for one to enjoy it from
anywhere but the shore, one must tuck this fact tidily into a recess of one's mind. Incidentally, Clay was penalized $1 for each use of the word "shark" while we were swimming.

It is also romantic. I don't mean "romantic" in its relational sense, but rather in the purer context of contemplation, sentimentality, nostalgia, or inspiration. Poets have written of it as
long as man has witnessed it, and one does not need to have ever seen the ocean to appreciate the romance of it. It is impossible to resist drawing all manner of metaphors (although trite from overuse) from its curious pulses, its ineffable eternality, its expanses and depths. It is
cleansing, purging, and--oh, all right--baptismal. (It is, undoubtedly, a catalyst for spiritual
meditation.) It inspires contemplation. Even as children we were required to put to memory that famous sonnet of Shakespeare (presumably in an attempt to ease our young minds into the
inevitable thanatopsis):

Like as the waves make toward the pebbled shore,
So our minutes hasten to their end...

Does contemplation get deeper than this? You'll have to forgive my moribund
thoughts. It must be the letdown of returning to the daily grind. I promise: I
really did have fun!

One more important thought about the ocean. Being at the ocean gives one a good tan. Never underestimate the virtue of a good tan.