Don't Trust The Sea

"Don't trust the sea" his parents would say when he tells them he's going for a swim "it's too dangerous".
"If I'm meant to die today, I'd rather die out there having fun than bored in here." The young him would reply.
They never tried to reply to that. Maybe it made them see how determined he was and remember how stubborn he was.

He grew up hearing stories about how untrustworthy the sea is. How many lives it took and how many dreams it buried, of people giving it their all and that being their last mistake, trying to cross it for a better life to only lose the one they had and ending up lost souls with no graves.

Of people his age, or from his circles, some of them were as fit or as good swimmers, yet they were "taken" by the deadly waves. That foe with its treacherous tides is famous for taking and more taking. He knows it too well cause he was almost taken once or twice.

He doesn't know how exactly it happened or how he was saved, thus he has no guarantee that it won't happen again. Yet he made peace with it as quickly as he survived it. He forgives the sea for almost killing him because, in his mind, he can't afford to hold grudge against something millions of times as big and as mighty as him. He can't afford to hate the thing that gave him the best of experiences of his life.

When he looks at the sea he does not remember the time he got knocked out by its waves and submerged by its violent velocity, losing every sense of direction to only accidentally feet the sand below him touch his knee right before he takes the last breath filling his limbs with saltwater instead of air. Kicking that sand with all the strength he could summon using the last dose of oxygen in his blood saved his life that day. But did he swim ou and call it a day? No! He smiled at the waves as if to say "Tough battle, You almost had me here." and resumed the wrestle.

He always thought that near defeats make us stronger. Defeats only happen when we admit them, meaning they should never happen.

When He looks at the sea, he remembers a completely different moment. That time he kept swimming deeper and deeper into the blue, away from the beach, from people, from noises and trouble. he had a moment with, not only the sea but with nature, with the world. The birds, the sun, the clear blue sky, its blue reflection on the sea. The moving fluid below him, hey formed a masterpiece of a living painting. The moment he realized that the painting was missing something earlier and that it was only complete when he found his place in it, that was the moment he shared with the universe. A feeling of belonging he does no feel so often amongst people kept him in there for a little longer, and then some longer. He did not want to leave his newly discovered refuge and go back to a life that wasn't treating him so well.

Image source: Pixabay