I've started going to the sea to swim

 I’ve started going to the sea to swim. There’s something about being on the edge of the world, between the waves, that makes my skin tingle from a sensation that stems from more than just the cold. Although the cold itself is, I admit, biting. 

There’s something too, something specific, about the smell of sea salt in the air, and about climbing down to an empty beach in the middle of winter. No accompaniment but a towel and a bag of warm clothes by your side. 

The bay itself doesn’t feel caged in by the steep cliff faces that tower up almost on all sides.  Instead, it encases you, offering shelter, and a sense of safety from the elements and the people above, on a level with the vastness of what lies before.  Above, the wind whips you around, and also, more obviously, around you. Great big gusts that mean although spring is coming, there’s waiting time yet. Down here, though, you can place your face to the wind. And breathe. 

Down the last of the stone steps and sinking as soon as sole meets sand. Shoes off and hopping from one bare foot to the other on grains so cold they feel hot beneath your toes. But it's a coldness that fades to a relative nothing when, after psyching yourself up and stripping off down to only your base, you run and 

Finally submerge your body in the sea foam. Wary of the pull that beckons you out, further still, and even more so of your own resistance that begs you to retain a sense of sane contact with the land that you struggle to stand on. 

You know she doesn’t want you. She won’t ask you to stay. It’s not that she’s hostile. It’s not her, it's you. More that you’re just not relevant to her. She doesn’t need you there to live. It’s not like that the other way round. 

Back up the beach and skin red raw, pricked by pins like nautical needles and with a head full of the joy of being. Scampering up the sand away from the salt on the shore, with a sense of what else to call it but glee as you take in big gulps of the air that’s always been there. Shivering from the cold, or is it the exhilaration, and the feeling you’ve been lacking of being alive. 

 On your way back to your belongings. Colder now than you had remembered was possible. You had forgotten, like usual, that the outside has more levels than you can imagine. 

Today, towelling off to traipse back to the top, to take the train back to town, and from town to tower block, you’ve found yourself at another. 

Tomorrow, who knows? Away from the waves and the scene of the sea that’s shrinking smaller and smaller behind you. Maybe tomorrow, maybe you’ll find another one still. Maybe you have to wait. Maybe you’ll sea.