A day at the beach

Last weekend I took Lucia to Carlsbad, California to hang out with my sister's family in Lego Land. Lego Land is weird and kind of creepy because the Lego structures are all faded-- it's more like a haunted Lego Land. My sister was obsessed with how the management could ever keep up with the dilapitating Lego structures. It's a valid concern. The 280,000 piece mini Taj Majal must be a bitch to rebuild or even keep clean

Thankfully, we only spent one day at Lego Land. The rest of the time we lazed on the beach with the surfers and stoners. Being in southern California is always a trip for me. I feel like a species from another planet, at the very least from another country. While I sat with my book in my practical black bikini, feeling pale and pasty, musing about about what it would be like to be blonde and tan, Lucia had a wholly different experience.  I remember being a kid at the ocean-- soft sand, infinite water, sun sun sun. I was never bored at the ocean.

I still don't get bored at the ocean. I read, I people watch, I tan, I swim. But I'm a grown up. I know I'll have to leave beach-heaven at some point. I don't get the sand-salt water-sun intoxication I got when I was a kid. Last weekend, I watched Lucia and it all came back. Between applications of sunscreen and snack breaks, she explored with her older cousins. They wandered down the beach to the Boccie Ball game where she and her cousins giggled at the old guys barking "shit, fuck and damn." Lucia went off on her own, and I watched her as she repeatedly stomped on the sand, contemplating the effects of her feet on the sand. She sat for a good 15 minutes, staring at the Pacific, singing to herself.

When I was in my twenties, someone told me that having a child was a great opportunity to have the childhood you never got to have. I actually did get to have that beach-heaven childhood, but, lucky me, now that I'm a parent I get to have it all again.