"Are you serious? You never seen an ocean in your life?" she stared at me wide eyed,her false lashes curving higher up,almost touching her brows. I would have drawn the whole geographical setting of our country alongwith the political and social history if only my ears had not turned red with embarrassment.It's absurd how we humans look down on somebody merely based on what they have seen or done in life and I represented another set of the same race who baked red in embarrassment over the opportunities one has missed in life.
However, she was kind enough to take me to the beach. ATLANTIC OCEAN! I remembered the lessons in geography classes, the map with a wide span of blue and the black letters spelling Atlantic, but I found myself staring right at it.It took my breath away. I had tried my first swimming lesson in the Methidrang in my home town and have crossed many other rivers(oh!shouldn't forget the Brahmaputra experience in Guahati).But the Atlantic was a new and never imagined experience.
I stared deep and inhaled the salty breeze. "Go, take a walk." She taunted me with her slender sunscreen-smeared hands."All alone!" she added as if I would ask her to accompany me.
I took few unsure steps,"what if the waves lashed hard on me in took me in its embrace?"raced through my nervous brain. My Methidrang had not given me enough swimming lessons to keep me afloat in this huge mass of water.
However, few seconds into the wet sand and I fell into the role of all the leading ladies in Nicholas Sparks' novels. Just as in NS novels, as I walked all alone, lost in the sand and the salty air, a dog(wish I knew what brand that was,lol...but certainly was a big one) appeared from my back and licked my finger(maybe I was waving it in my sheer nervousness???).It frightened me and my surprised shriek double-frightened him. Just then a man, nah! a boy in his early twenties came running and apologized for his dog's behavior. Well! if only it had been NS' book, I would have fallen in love with that dog(or maybe the owner?blush!blush!). But this was no NS tale, so I(an old lady) smiled at the boy and he scooted away before I could finish saying,"that's ok."
The dog's episode made me stop my legs from taking any further steps. So I shifted my position and faced the ocean. As I stood looking at it,sadness enveloped me. I thought of thousands of Africans who were brought here by the waves of this same ocean burying their freedom in the sun parched homeland enslaved to work on foreign shores. I pictured thousands bodies floating in this same water, the bodies of those slaves who breathed their last in the ships which was no less than hell sailing on Earth. I felt a shudder down my spine. A big wave knocked me back to my real world as it washed away the sand I was standing on. I jumped away further and sat down. In the sitting position I thought of countless women sitting on this same shore waiting for their beloved to return from some agenda on the other side of this vast ocean.I could reckon the poets singing of lovers placing hopes in the vast ocean to bring back their love.Countless tales of sorrows floated with the empty shells on the shore I sat, with my gaze fixed on the dark green water.
"Why tears?" the same sound knocked. As she pulled me to my feet, I saw many kids giggle with buckets and shovels(perhaps with a sand castle in mind); young boys with their surfing boards and countless ladies attired in fashionable bikinis. I smiled a weak smile and the stories I silently had been listening to in my heart submerged with my first big spoon of chocolate ice cream.
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