(See what I am saying?): Where I stood today

January 27, 2005

Where I stood today

I drove down to the beach by the ventura harbor because i wanted to talk but didn't know what to say. because i wanted to leave but didn't know where to go. because i was angry and i didn't understand why.

the tide was rising. the sun was setting. I couldn't get anything off of my mind, even the things i could change. The sets were breaking and rumbling into the edge of the earth in a white rush of salt and milk, sounding like a million gin and tonics sizzling into the sand below my feet.

prada took off into the rumbling white line that blurred the difference between the land the and water. she loves the open space. i think she can feel freedom in spaces where she senses no edges. she was wearing the blinking white light on her collar she was given at christmas. it darted like a firefly flickering in the distance in and out of the surf. watching her move across the beach made me smile. and if it wasn't for her, i would have been standing there entirely alone at the edge of the earth.

it wouldn't go away.

i stopped walking. no one was around. the beach houses over the hill were dark and the only sound was the ocean breaking and rumbling into the edge of the earth in a white rush of salt and milk that sounding like a million gin and tonics sizzling into the sand below my feet.

and then i understood why.

it took me 1 year to be taught that the man who wins is not the last man standing, but the first to go.

i stood there facing the setting sun and the rising tide. i watched the momentum of the earth as it rolled away from the sun, sending the great white walls of water rumbling into the sand under my feet, which in turn, pulled the sand back away from the land out into the the sea toward the setting sun. it could have been the most beautiful moment in my life. standing there, watching the sun and the sea and moon and the tide and every element in the world turning like perfect clockwork in the gears that never stop spinning inside the giant machine called god.

and there i was, like i was the only living boy in new york. like i was the only living boy in california. like i was the only living boy in my life.

like i was the last man standing.

like i was the last man to figure it out.

like i had learned my lesson and should know better.

whether there is another life or not, i thought, i just didn't want to be in this one for too long. i didn't want to be standing alone like that. i didn't want see what i was seeing or feel what i was feeling and know that i will be the only one around to share it with.

the biggest curse isn't to be in pain, but to be aware of it.

the second biggest isn't to be alive, but to be the only one doing so.

i had finally learned something from all of this. i had learned what it meant to be lucky. to be blessed. to be the fortunate one. to have the most beautiful moments of your life happen while you are not alone. and then to leave gracefully before you were down by the ventura harbor watching the sun and the sea and moon and the tide and every element in the world spin like perfect clockwork while standing all alone.

Posted by Todd Roeth at January 27, 2005 10:54 PM

Comments

stop looking so hard.
it always happens when you're not searching it out.

Posted by: the beekeeper on January 28, 2005 09:24 AM

being aware of pain is not a curse. pain is a complex and deliberate messenger and if you don't become aware of it, the damage will be far greater by the time you do. there is freedom and comfort to be found in solitude. lessons, memories, enrichment don't always happen when someone else is there to share it. i would even say they can preclude it. i can't think of a more appropriate or spectacular place to be alone in the world than on the beach at sunset.

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