So it begins...

     The sand rolled out from under her toes, as the wave receded to the sea. The grains were the size of Israeli couscous and amber colored. Nature's foot massage and it's restorative powers were bringing her back to a centered place. That place where a deep belly breath can clear your head, while sending electric goosebumps to your appendages and resetting yourself.

     She didn't want to turn around. She let her feet sink into the ground. With each consecutive wave, her heels were dug in just a centimeter more, as the beach had a steep rake to it. All the people were gathered just beyond her peripheral vision, yet she could hear them laughing, talking and throwing logs on the fire. They had arrived for their annual lobster bake and this year almost all were in attendance. The hood of an old Chevy was the center piece of the cooking station. It would be covered in seaweed, foil wrapped corn and potatoes, steamers, occasionally mussels, and last, but not least, the lobsters. This would be encased under a damp canvas tarp and left to steam to perfection.

     It was low tide and the youngest children were splashing in the tide pools behind her near the high water mark. The adults were wrapping the veggies, collecting seaweed, unloading the trucks, sedans and bikes, then schlepping the various foods and serving items to a low make shift drift wood table by the fire. Teenagers were setting up a volleyball net and throwing frisbees. Dogs were chasing crabs, swimming and trying to steal a clam or two.

     A finger tapped her on the shoulder. It was a warm and calloused finger. She knew by the height of the "hello" who had come to fetch her.

     "Devin, who sent you?" she asked, knowing full well it  was Janette.

     "Jan, she's worried it's too soon for you to be here," he replied, "and I'm afraid she's right by the look of it."

     Turning around she said, "I wouldn't be here if I wasn't sure." Yet her voice had a catch in it that he'd never heard before, or least only once before, at the funeral.

     She looked up, her eyes smarting, as she hid her true feels to the best of her ability. "Go on ahead, I'll join you all in a second or two," she sighed, and with that Devin walked back up the beach to the fire.

     Maybe it is too soon. Familiar doesn't feel natural any more. More thoughts like these percolated around her brain as she found herself not returning up the beach, but rather choosing to wade into the waves. She finally stopped when the water was knee deep and she knew she'd regret having wet clothes after the sunset if she didn't stop there.

     The riotous splashing and exclaiming about how cold the water was could only mean one person. Again, she didn't have to turn.

     "Ronny, you've lived here half your life and you still find the summer water cold?",

     "Yup, Delphine, and you will be too if you don't come up by the fire right now," he laughed and added, "or if you want to stay cold, we have some of that Elephant beer you like to drink!"

     Delphine caved, turned around and they skipped out of the water, hand in hand, all the way back to the bonfire.

                                                                           ***

     The moon woke her up. It was shining through her childhood window, streaming into her eyes. She kept them closed to listen to the now high tide wash over the rocks below the house. Delphine was uncomfortably full. She'd eaten the deviled eggs with curry, the steamers, mussels, corn, potatoes, a whole lobster plus another tail, and had not one, but two slices of blueberry pie. Thank goodness she resisted the s'mores, or it would have been her stomach waking her, not the moon.

     Surf collided with snoring as her ears refined their range. She knew her father's and sister's snores. She was surprise to hear the dog, curled behind her knees snoring, but guessed she wasn't often that tired at home; run ragged by a day a the beach.

     Ragged. An island name. An island roughly two miles off the Coast of Harpswell, ME. An island where a dear poet lived, bought by her doting Dutch husband and the inspiration for the following poem. An island about six miles as the crow flies from the island where she's resting now.

Ragged Island, by Edna St. Vincent Millay

There, there where those black spruces crowd
To the edge of the precipitous cliff,
Above your boat, under the eastern wall of the island;
And no wave breaks; as if
All had been done, and long ago, that needed
Doing; and the cold tide, unimpeded
By shoal or shelving ledge, moves up and down,
Instead of in and out;
And there is no driftwood there, because there is no beach;
Clean cliff going down as deep as clear water can reach;

No driftwood, such as abounds on the roaring shingle,
To be hefted home, for fires in the kitchen stove;
Barrels, banged ashore about the boiling outer harbour;
Lobster-buoys, on the eel-grass of the sheltered cove:

There, thought unbraids itself, and the mind becomes single.
There you row with tranquil oars, and the ocean
Shows no scar from the cutting of your placid keel;
Care becomes senseless there; pride and promotion
Remote; you only look; you scarcely feel.

Even adventure, with its vital uses,
Is aimless ardour now; and thrift is waste.

Oh, to be there, under the silent spruces,
Where the wide, quiet evening darkens without haste
Over a sea with death acquainted, yet forever chaste.

     An island near this island, where Delphine has been coming for decades. An island on which she went from being a girl to a woman. Gone from chaste to knowing, from innocence to acquainted with loss and now desperately trying to braid herself back together. Tonight all saw her scars, they were too fresh to hide; not even seven months, let alone the seven years it takes to grow a new skin.

     Another season is coming to an end, the second of four without him. How long does it take to grow a new heart? It won't be made of the same material; her DNA had altered, immutable, she was now a new person. One she didn't yet know, but was obvious for all to see. She longed to be of one mind and spirit, and Nature, particularly the seacoast, usually delivered her that tranquility. But not this time...she was admitting to being adrift and needed to own it to move  forward.