The Wind Left

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Sour mango. Not so sour to me.

We went to the seaside yesterday, thinking to blow some heat off. The journey on the way was almost meditative except for the occasional sticky feeling that was brought by the weather. The air-conditioner of the car was not at its best. The sun was slowly setting. In my head was the imagery of the beach with its windy breeze, sand soft under my bare feet, the horizon so vast and wide, it would make you weep.

I praised myself for being able to drift easily to places in my head without actually being there in physical form. It was not that I lost the grasp of reality in front of me. It was more that the reality was cramming itself in me, it was like diving head-first into every single word uttered, every action that happened, every blink of their eyes that snapped.

I felt suffocated in a way that every thing felt so close that my breathing became rapid and if I didn't shut my eye lids, the blood would drip, out of the eye sockets.

I started with sour mango. I loved sour things or food that did not have a strong sweet taste to it. Intense sweetness was repulsive to me and whenever they offered sweet fruit slices to me, I would complain of some nauseous feeling taking over me. I did try to eat. It was just not my thing to eat.

The beach was still, devoid of a hint of wind. That sticky feeling sticked to the skin like glue. The yellow purple hue of the sky at dusk, the hot red sun hidden behind a thin curtain of grey melancholy clouds, that small ineffectual crash of wave, bothered me, the heat unrelenting.

We left the seaside, it was not welcoming. The wind was absent, and our skins were still covered with salty diamonds.

Sat back in the car, with the whole idea to cool down at the beach evaporated in the heat mist of my breathing. I was trying to cool down in the car, with the help of an aging air-con that might just stop working because the blasting heat wave never ceased.

Never go out to the beach these days, if there are no signs of wind, and especially if the sun is a wild crazy goon gone absolutely mad.