A Call From Home
One of the first words I ever spoke was “ocean.” I pronounced it oonda then, and I’d often ask my parents to take me to see the big oonda. As an adult, the first thing I do when I travel to another country is search for water – a coastline, if possible. Standing on quiet Brazilian sands years ago, I realized that even though I was thousands of miles away from my home in Florida, I was home.
The world of language barriers fell away, and I was left with the primal pull of a force so deeply ingrained in me, I knew it before my own name. Sometimes, the quiet is louder than any sound. The sea spoke softly that night, allowing the moon to weave silver in her midnight skin. I knelt down, listening to her gentle murmurs – to the faint music she played across the shore. She whispered of secrets long forgotten…of dreams hidden inside her depths.
The salt water ran cool and gentle over my hand till there was no longer a distinction between the two – till the sea became my own skin. Without a single word, she reminded me that before I ever took my first steps on land, I lived for nine months in the water – that all life on earth descended from her. In the dark calm of a foreign land, I was called back home.
If we listen closely, she calls to us all.
-Allison LaBine
http://www.motherocean.org
Photo by Allison LaBine
allison labine 
April 16, 2012 at 3:53 pm
beautiful photo. I’ll be going for a run this evening with my boyfriend on the beach. this is a great reminder to be thankful for the ability to do that.
April 16, 2012 at 8:06 pm
I love the ocean too, there is just something about it that makes you feel like nothing can bother you, like you are cleansed of everything. All your troubles are washed away. My grandmother, which is now passed away always used to say that you haven’t been to the ocean unless you have atleast stuck one toe in. I will tell you every time I am at the beach I do just that in honor of her. I have even been at the beach here in the Pacific Northwest when there has been snow on the sand and there I am with my toe in that 30 or lower degree water. Geez I need to get to the beach and get my toe in…Thanks for giving me a nice break from my writing today!
Gabriella Deveraux
Owner/Hotlit Books http://www.hotlitbooks.com
April 17, 2012 at 3:33 pm
Thank you for sharing your experience, Gabriella. The ocean can have a healing power like no other. Snow on the shore…that must have been something to see. It doesn’t matter the temperature or the weather, the ocean is breathtaking in any form she takes.