There's something about spending an entire day on the beach by yourself that's somewhat lonesome, but it has a bigger, more important affect which is that of complete independence. Looking out at the endless world that lay ahead, surrounded by the tanned and untanned of Charleston's elite, choosing to drown out the sound of incoming tide with podcasts and the sight of pelicans soaring so near above with powerful shades.
I was dropped with beach chair and bathing suit in hand at an early morning hour. As the humidity increased elsewhere, the shore maintained a blissful breeze. The temperature of South Carolinian water is radically different from that of the Cape, which I grew accustomed to during my stint in Boston. There is no bone chilling shock as you wade in. Rather, the mild water gives you the impression you are stepping into a hot bath left vacant for forty minutes. It doesn't stop the hundreds of determined vacationers to flock to the beach. I can't wait until Labor Day when the boogie boards will be put away for the season and I will be at peace with the serenity of a much more subdued setting.
I love knowing I can escape to a beach a mere four miles away, a drive consisting mainly of a bridge built low to the marshy wetlands below. I can only imagine the reptilian that feast so near to the traffic.
Life down South isn't always such a breeze of freedom. There's not having a car, which barely gets me out of the complex and across the street to a community lake, for this heat forbids me to do more than that, and there isn't a public bus in sight. There's relying on people for rides to get to my new job as a K4 teacher assistant. Life is like that. You get thrown into a new place, having to adjust to new surroundings brings about challenges.
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