I grew up in a place where the nearest ocean was about 13 hours by car. I saw the ocean a handful of times in my life, but didn't really get a chance to experience it until I was 20. Then I became obsessed.
I loved the sheer laziness of spending a whole day outside laying around, reading books, napping, talking, snacking, swimming when it got hot. I loved jumping over or diving under the waves as they crashed in, or floating on top, their saltiness on my tongue. The ocean felt like my ultimate pampering, luxurious experience.
A few years later, I was living in Spain. I took advantage of a long weekend in late February to attend a three-day surfing camp. Even though southern Spain is extremely temperate (is that an oxymoron?), it was still winter, and therefore still windy and a bit chilly. One day, it was too windy and stormy to surf. Our instructor drove us to a point where we could look out over the beach where we had been surfing. Tall, angry waves crashed in furiously. The wind from the sea blew my hair straight up in the air.
As I stood there, I realized I had been thinking about the ocean all wrong. I suddenly remembered that in centuries past, and even today, people fear the ocean. The ocean takes lives. I realized that the ocean I loved to play in is easily converted by a few shifts in pressure to the ocean that takes lives with tsunamis, hurricanes, shipwrecks.
I had not given the ocean the respect it deserved.
I still love to play in the ocean, but now I am not so naive. I'm a strong swimmer, but I don't assume all would be well if I ended up swimming past the boundaries, or swimming on a beach with strong tides.
My experience with birth is like that windy day on the ocean. I remember reading several birth stories in which the women described labor as a feeling of sheer power moving through them like a freight train. At the time, I wondered what that would feel like, but I neglected to think to remember that freight trains can be dangerous. Power is to be respected. The power of birth is beautiful, like the power of the ocean, but I will never underestimate it again.
I loved the sheer laziness of spending a whole day outside laying around, reading books, napping, talking, snacking, swimming when it got hot. I loved jumping over or diving under the waves as they crashed in, or floating on top, their saltiness on my tongue. The ocean felt like my ultimate pampering, luxurious experience.
A few years later, I was living in Spain. I took advantage of a long weekend in late February to attend a three-day surfing camp. Even though southern Spain is extremely temperate (is that an oxymoron?), it was still winter, and therefore still windy and a bit chilly. One day, it was too windy and stormy to surf. Our instructor drove us to a point where we could look out over the beach where we had been surfing. Tall, angry waves crashed in furiously. The wind from the sea blew my hair straight up in the air.
As I stood there, I realized I had been thinking about the ocean all wrong. I suddenly remembered that in centuries past, and even today, people fear the ocean. The ocean takes lives. I realized that the ocean I loved to play in is easily converted by a few shifts in pressure to the ocean that takes lives with tsunamis, hurricanes, shipwrecks.
I had not given the ocean the respect it deserved.
I still love to play in the ocean, but now I am not so naive. I'm a strong swimmer, but I don't assume all would be well if I ended up swimming past the boundaries, or swimming on a beach with strong tides.
My experience with birth is like that windy day on the ocean. I remember reading several birth stories in which the women described labor as a feeling of sheer power moving through them like a freight train. At the time, I wondered what that would feel like, but I neglected to think to remember that freight trains can be dangerous. Power is to be respected. The power of birth is beautiful, like the power of the ocean, but I will never underestimate it again.
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