Okay, yes I'm about to do the nerdiest thing ever and use the ocean in a metaphor about consciousness. Oh my god, how many times have I heard that?! I know for sure I have a permanent image of Dr. Wayne Dyer paddling around in the ocean and musing on "presence"... it's been done, people, it's been done for sure.
Maybe it's because I'm in the land of Hawaiian shirts and mai-tais...on an island that actually feels like it was built for the pleasure of it's visitors...but, lots of stuff that would otherwise feel cliche, suddenly feels okay. So. Onward with the ocean metaphors!
Ahem.
On our second day here, wilted from the sun and a little bummed out by our shag-carpeted hotel room (which we later grew to love...not the carpet, but the hotel) we took a recommend for a great beach and took a detour there for an early-afternoon swim. Kua Bay. Down a dirt road, water nearly fluorescent blue, and waves to salivate over...we were stripped down and in the water within minutes of arriving.
The waves close to shore were rough, you could barely keep your footing. But just a bit further out there was a kind of calm, you could ride the smooth humps of the waves before they broke, and this is where we waited, floating, watching for a wave strong enough to catch us and hurl us back to shore.
It was a little scary, this position out by all the boogie boarders. I love the ocean, love waves even more, but am not the strongest swimmer, and can't even use a neti pot because the feeling of water up my nose is so deeply upsetting to me, so the pummeling we got from missed or ill-timed wave catching sort of shook me up.
However, the thrill of a good ride was addictive, so in and out we went, paddling past the break and then being carried (sometimes violently) back in. And, as is the way with these things, the waiting for the waves became the longest and (for me at least) most profound part of the adventure.
It didn't take long to begin learning how to read the waves. This one will be too small, this one will break too late, this one is terrifying so I think I'll skip it oh my god I can't skip it I'm going to have to oh shit...PADDLE!!!!
The wave is coming...and that is the way of things. The wave has all this force behind it and if I'm not already diving under to let it pass, then I sure as hell better move with it, or I am going to get knocked on my ass. Or worse.
And as I sat there, waiting for waves, trying to read them, scared and thrilled, I thought about the movement of my own life (here it comes...). I thought about the current of progress and of growth--how strong it is, and I thought about how sometimes I see that wave coming and I get frightened. And instead of just going with it, or diving beneath the surface to allow its passage, I just stand there. Unmoving. And in those moments the crest catches me and knocks me under, fills my nose and mouth with sea water and makes me feel like I might drown. And how after too many of those I'm just going to want to sit on the sand...take myself out of the game completely. And then I'm safe, but also far from the thrill of the ride.
The natural majesty of a place like Hawaii, particularly of the ocean, does make a body feel that nature really knows what it's doing. It has a prowess and a purpose that one would be best served to just get out of the way of, and these encounters with the waves just brought that fact home. I am not a wave maker, after all, I am a wave rider. And if I do nothing else in this life other than learn how to tell the difference between a wave I should ride and one I should dive under, and most of all learn to never ever stop and stand in the path of a wave already making its way, then I think will have done something right.
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