I feel so land-girt these days… its odd that so many of us live away from the sea and yet it calls to us like a primordial force, reminding us of our fear to be far from it, our sustainer, our familiar, the flat horizon always with us, glittering, moonlit, moving or monochrome. Those of us who don’t live with it yearn for it, flock to it, daring to stand firm in the face of huge storming waves in winter we then pack ourselves onto beaches in the summer time and bask like mermaids in the warm rays of the sun.
I keep my glittering beach days locked in my heart to sustain me through long winters. Last Lughnasadh I bought kaleidoscopes in Bridport, and then sat on Hive Beach and gazed at the honey yellows, blues and whites in myriad shattered images like a child in thrall. I painted Portland Bill in grey vignettes in my notebook - like a long hazy line extending into the blue.
Every year I make a glittering beach day to carry with me. The year before it happened on Rhossili beach on the Gower. We had come over the Beacons in driving rain and when we reached the beach we wanted it so much that we walked in the wet wind anyway. As we approached the Worms Head, the weather cleared and the evening sun lit the beach in great shining sheets of slicked smoothness - entrancing. I was so in the magic of it that I don’t remember how I got down to the beach, but didn’t want to leave it when I did, so intent was I in distilling that moment.
This year, the bone white beaches of the Western Isles are calling me - the soft shell sand and the seals will be right by our cottage. I am dreaming of the glittering beach days to come.
