Baptism

I let a salty wave scoop me up in its palm and float. I splay on my back, letting the world around me go muffled as the water fills my ears. Closing my eyes, I let the sun warm my face.

And I pray.

I pray for wholeness. I pray for healing. That I leave this place better than I have been lately. That I leave behind the heaviness I’ve been carrying around with me the last few months. 

I remind myself that this is the living. That I am not defined by the triumph and tragedy that has befallen me but rather by the life I choose. And that this girl- wild haired and laughing and talking to strangers and baptizing herself in the sea- is the best version of me, the one I must carry into my everyday life. The one I must seek to recreate when I’m not in this place. 

In the quiet the Universe asks me a question;

And instinctively I answer nothing.

Because of course nothing. I’ve spent so much of my life losing. 

Why require more of me? I ask.

Because I require more of you, It says, plainly, simply. 

I start swimming laps, out to ocean, back to shore and away again, letting in the din of Platis Gialos beach, determined not to hear anymore. I swim until my feet can’t touch the bottom anymore, my lungs burning from the effort.

It stops me dead in my tracks. I starfish in the water, dipping my head back into the silence of the ocean. I close my eyes and breathe in and out, listening to my breath echo in my body. I feel present in my skin for the first time in a long time.

I surrender.

I find God in the water.

I love her as myself.