Breezy Days

Today's my 73rd birthday.  Ava will turn five in two months.  Just before I was turning five, I was returning home with my family from a year in India.  We celebrated my birthday in Rome where my cake was laced with rum, and I didn't like it.  I was a shy little girl then.  Ava and her generation are miles beyond...

On a Wednesday afternoon this August, Ava held Auntie Lisa's hand as they stood at the edge of the ocean.  She held tight as each little surge shoved her a bit.  Within an hour, she let go and began to feel the delight of meeting those surges with her own strength.

On Saturday, she got her first taste of the boogie board -- Whitney showed her how to center her body, hold on, and she shoved her into the little white water rolling in from the bigger waves.  Soon came:  "Again! Again!...Farther!  Bigger!"  I was out there with them, enjoying the glorious day -- the air was 73' and the water 70'.  Like riding a bicycle, catching little waves and diving under white water came naturally.  Simply swimming around in that gently rocking sea brought deep pleasure suffused with memory.

By Sunday, Ava was out much deeper with Whitney or Lisa, riding one after another.  Once she and Lisa caught the same wave and rode in side by side, laughing together.  And in the afternoon, it was she and a 6-year-old in the shallows together, riding tandem.

When it was time to leave, she was in a big inner tube, catching whitewater by herself.  As she refused the call in, she simply headed straight out to sea, all confidence and spirited defiance.

My delight in watching Ava become a little mermaid was enhanced by the memories it brought of my dad taking us kids to the beaches at Avila and Pismo.  He plopped us onto those big old canvas inflatable rafts, (red on one side, blue on the other) and shoved us into wave after wave.  I can still remember my thrill with the speed and the rush of water all around...and the feel of my hands clinging to the rough canvas.  Eventually he taught us to body surf too, so we could know the fun that he had had on those very beaches, when he was a kid.  I was several years older than Ava...I hope she remembers this weekend!