Somewhere Beyond This Side of the Sea

I live in a bucolic wonderland and these spring days only make it worse. The brilliancy of the sky, the colours of the fields, all the flowers, & the intensity of the scenery is everything you'd expect from one of those impressionist paintings. It's beyond gorgeous. I kid you not, there is nothing like France. Just give me a glass of wine & let me sit in the lazy sunshine to watch the flies go by, captured in time, by this magical place...

But here's the funny thing... I so want out.

Out of this beauty, out of this country, out of this life.

I'm having near daily urges to pack up the tribe, grab The Man, and book a direct flight to the tackiest place I know on earth. The place that screams "tat" and frightens civilized people. A place that is no more than a sand-bar in the Atlantic, with enough tourist shops, malls, putt-putt golf centers, and pizza joints to make your head spin. It's tacky, it's covered in concrete and neon signs, and it's about as far away as you can get from a dream vacation on the beach.

BUT.....but.....but....

Here I am literally aching, itching, and desiring with all my heart to be back in that place.

I want to sit by the sea and listen to other parents yell at their kids in English. I want to know that I can get a cheeseburger at 4 in the afternoon and no one will think I'm nuts. I want to go out in my sweatpants & flip flops and actually look over dressed. I want to walk into a bookstore and freak out because everything is in English. I want to watch The Man try and hole-in-one that stupid flamingo at the 136th Street mini-golf course.

I need beer coozies with the town's name tattooed all over them. I want to get steamed crabs and throw them all over the front porch of my parents' apartment and watch as the seagulls try and catch the empty shells. I want to hear Bubba, The Princess, and MH shriek with laughter as Rosie falls in the waves. I want to tell the kids to watch out for the "under toad!"  I want a snow cone on the boardwalk that stains our lips bright blue and can only be removed by funnel cake, powdered sugar, and iced tea.

I want to be able to open the door to that apartment and have all my years come flooding back to me. Senior week, my summers as a bread girl, working at the tennis center, riding my bike to the movies, holding on for dear life behind a beach cleaning machine...

I want to be chez moi. Be amongst things that comfort me, make me forget, make me remember. I want to surround my people, my man & our kids, in my world and finally, finally, finally...let go.

But....alors...

For now, I'll sit in my garden, amongst the wildflowers and buttercups, in that incredible light & it's breezes coming from that other ocean to the south, and try not to cry.

What a beautiful hell to be living in.