Everyone has a specific location that has changed their life for the better or for worse. Whether it was a one-time thing or something traditional, it has helped them grow and discover things about themselves, maybe without even realizing it. For surgeons, it's the operating rooms and traumas entering their emergency rooms. For athletes, it's the fields they play on. A writer has a library or quiet space. Location is key to understanding a person or animal. The location one chooses helps them to become more comfortable.
A student chooses locations to study. The smallest detail of a location can tell someone's story. It's in how one describes such imagery, why it's important to them, what they've felt, or what they've learned throughout the years. One location–one moment–can alter someone's life forever. A smell, taste, or feel of that location can change someone's perspective. It can do so whether they want to make memories for life, feel at home, or create a new tradition.
The waves are crashing. The sun is setting. People are laughing and embracing one another under the sunset. I feel the sand squish slowly through my toes as I gaily walk down the shoreline of the beach. My all-time favorite place to be is the beach. This is my happy place when I'm in distress or when I'm asked where I want to be. One minute you are relaxing lazily on the sandy seashore reading an invigorating book, and the next, you're meeting new people and finding small adventures.
I sit engrossed and allow the foamy mist from the rampant ocean spray my face lightly, as though it were the touch of a feather. No matter what beach I go to, I feel at home. I spend hours in the warmth of the water, feeling at peace. I experience the purest excitement when watching a bright orange sunrise over the horizon of what seems to be an infinite ocean. If I get lucky, I see a school of dolphins along with that beautiful sunrise. It's beautiful enough to make a grown person cry. If I could, I'd live at the beach. To escape and sit quietly on the beach is my idea of paradise. The beach has an unpredictability to it. It could be calm one moment and the next, turn into an aggressive and powerful force of nature that we cannot control.
I like to compare myself to that unpredictability. The water is the calmest and most dangerous location on the beach. Unpredictable. It's the place where I spend my days, for hours. I look at the boats and distanced dolphins. There was a particular moment I remember: I was letting the waves carry me as I floated. I realized that there was all this life living under me and that the ocean was the only way I could explain life and people. I could explain personalities as the ocean. Some people are myopic and shallow–clear waters that you can see right through. Others are deep, dark, and hidden below thousands of leagues. I could compare the high and low tides to moments in life.
Each part of the ocean holds a meaning for life. I feel like I'm on the edge, watching the ocean pounding around me and trying to find the right moment to jump in without being washed out to sea or thrown back on the shore. I'm trying to find that elusive space–the balance that doesn't actually exist. The ocean is vast and empty. Your actions shape where you go and, yet, there is only so much you can do. Every action in the ocean can affect everything that lives within its expanse or under the water itself. Water is known to be able to change its state of form from solid to liquid.
In addition, the sea is infinite and however hard we try, we must sail through the calm and rough parts of it. My life has its highs and lows, and if anything gives me enough force, I am sure to soar to fantastic heights. If you were to catch me during the right time of day, you would be able to see all of my emotions spread across the floor like shells on a beach. I usually end up washing them away before anyone has the chance to see them. Though I can be very powerful and sometimes calm, I still find a way to always come crashing back down.
