To Walk Like This

Diana Instant+I walk down toward the water, to follow the beach into town.  But the tide is so low, and the morning fog is so thick that even when I hit wet sand that is smoothed and firm from the stroke of waves, the water is still out of sight.  There is only the sound of the ocean's constant sighing, somewhere far to my right.

On my left, I can't see the road or the mountain, either.  There is just the cloud's breath, as if exhaled into the cold.  The occassional chatter of children a long distance away, or the dark shadow of a person or a family walking near by.  My body is immersed in the experience in which my mind has been swimming all week.  Commanded to surrender to the unknowing and the unseeing.  Forced to adjust my eyes to blindness.

Life is like this, maybe all the time.  Sometimes you get more clues than others.  "You are somewhere between the water and the shore."  Or only, "You have ground beneath your feet.  Now, walk."  This is a gift, I think, to have the earth teach me this lesson in my body, for all my senses to feel.

I can learn to walk like this, I tell myself.  I try to believe it, to practice, to take my fear by the hand and make her my companion. 

I step.  I breathe.  I do it again, and again. 

I sink into my instincts about how far I am traveling, and I turn and walk into the cloud on my left just in time to cross the street into town.