There and back again. Back and gone again. I came home, or here, or there, again briefly, shortly, just for a few days. Not enough time, but some time, some time which is more than no time. On Sunday, yesterday, we walked in the low tide onto the green rocks. Wet feet, wet sand, gritty in our toes, all tangled in sea kelp. And it was the sheer bright of noon and everything was thinly glowing and the air was thick and wet with water. The entire world was silver--shining back sharply against all that ocean and air. We sat on the hot rocks in the cool morning and I was at once hungry for everything--needing to take it all in big fists and gulps, choking on the thickness of an old life--and willfully inanimate, trying to freeze out little chunks of time, trying to settle the minutes.
Today we drove up the coast to the airport, and today the world is clear bright blue blown empty by the wind off the water. Driving through Half Moon Bay, I get it. I understand suddenly that I have lived almost all of my life in ambient beauty, lazy and passive in a world of small wonders.
