Sand and an Umbrella

With school now over for the greater bulk of us, I’m sure that we can all finally take a month or two to kick back and do what we enjoy. Whether that be traveling, sleeping, gaming, reading, learning, or just hanging out with good friends, the summer is truly a canvas for infinite passion, only constrained by time.

Today, I’m deciding to take a foray out of analysis and instead reminisce over my favourite time of year. If my invisible audience finds pleasures to be had in retrospect, please let me know so I can mix the current fold of this blog.

You’ve just said goodbye for two months. Your duty, your purpose, your relationships are now sunken into an easy rest, not to be found until time grasps them from the impervious current of concrete walls and fifty-pound textbooks. In the thick heat of the outside world, you take a final moment to look back at school. It is now late in the day; everyone has left the stage. The bright hue of sunshine casts a shadow upon ten months of life, all defeats, heartaches, and triumphs to be forgotten. You typically walk home, but now you savour this last precious moment in a triumphant stride, encumbered by exuberance to the unknown beyond.

Gravity. It is pure, but its true impact is not realized. You are done. All your work added up, and now you are done. You can roam freely, unrestrained by the next due date or test. But you find comfort in restraint; it is second nature to you. Birds flock to a faraway paradise, yet you are a turtle, hiding in shell and sand and stone and time. You look to the other side of the bridge, but the rushing water below is where adventure is to be had.

Sand. Dormant, yet ultimately a product of the work of millennia. Its shape conforms to the size of your feet like the perfect pair of boots, your hands like the gauntlets of the Earth itself. Yet it pours off, along with it this sensation and the warmth baked in the suns glow. You can savour the moment with another step, but it will always end. You are not a statue, and the beach is not a kingdom.

Home. A harbour of memories, and life in its fullest extent. A staging site for all triumphs to be had, but not forever. You are reminded that each season is a petal, and every dandelion dies eventually. Beauty is not everlasting, and withers away to the march of two hands. Tick, tock. Tick, tock. You awaken from your slumber, in an ethereal haze that puts your mind to ecstasy. The drapes of the window are closed, yet the sun still manages to seep through, highlighting a trail of dust in its wake. A journey across space and over millions of miles, met in a bittersweet ending with the remnants of all around to dance in the air.

Vacation. A simple word, yet too complex to truly understand. It is a voyage within a journey; distance from distance. The end is only an illusion: the road always continues on somewhere else. The white coasts of England, the orange horizon of California, the lime spectacle of Fiji. They form the world, a puzzle with pieces that do not line up; chaos mended by beauty. The bigger picture is often left behind, yet vacation is a truth that must be uncovered by curiosity and time. You know that the world has no tolerance without coin though, and time does not allow impossible journeys.

Colours. The true painters of the world lie above, beyond the blue and clouds, wrapped in science and sorcery. You take no worry at this though. Blue represents a trail still unspoilt by man, founded in purity and a spirit that is beyond our comprehension. Its marvel is seen by all, yet dismissed in its constant beauty and compassion. You feel the course dirt, muzzled grass, and swaying breeze push against your cheeks, with the sun bringing the glow out of our finer details. Exuberance captures you as the blue horizon turns orange, and the sun is reflected onto the rippled waves of water. In its wake, you are left with a sweet chill, and now the blue turns darker, darker, darker. Pivots of light and life glimmer upon you until the cycle repeats.

Alone. Surrounded by others, yet only you understand yourself. The summer had opened your doors, and only you can enter them. You no longer share common ideals with those around you. Aimless, yet you take great solace in this. The summer is bittersweet, and will not last. You wish for it, yet there are only so many summers you will find until you become dust, swirling around in an infinite trance to nowhere.

That has no bearing. Compassion outweighs inevitability, and soon your duty will arise. Green doors will fly open, and literature, math, and essays will fly back out. Leaves will fall, curl, and wither away, left by a cold, desolate wonderland ripe with more adventure to be had. You will never understand these cycles, yet it is time. And time beats us all.

I hope the tone of this story was more towards the bittersweet side, as unlike the last two posts I made this up on the spot. The next blog post will most likely be the last one I post before I leave for a Cadet training course for six weeks, so I hope to leave the blog on a good note before then. For now, kick back and enjoy the summer. 🙂