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Commentary
Walking through another pandemic winter
The dark sea shimmers in the cold light. It’s glorious, I think, as I arrive at the beach in late afternoon. I’m already chilly and I’m tired, weighed down by another year of the pandemic. How pleasant it would be and how tempting it is to turn back — return to the warmth of home and comfort of a hot cup of tea.
Instead, I secure a scarf around my neck and face, dig mittened hands into my parka pockets and head out against the biting northwest wind. Two steps forward, one back, as the wind pushes me across the sand. The sand sweeps the beach, creating patterns of dark and light.
I reach for my phone; snap a few pictures of the dancing grains. A burst of wind drives them from the dunes to the sea. Then ceases. I pause. Snap another photograph.
My fingers are icy cold. I stuff them back into the mittens; they tingle, then ache. The wind howls in my ears, drowning out the sounds of the ocean.
How foolish to be walking here on this frigid day. You’ll end up with frostbite, I tell myself. Turn back. The only other person around, a man with a dog, has returned to his car. Maybe I should follow his example.
But something carries me ahead.
I struggle to warm my stiff fingers. I move them methodically, one by one, using the Italian I’m learning, to count, finger by finger: uno, duo, tre, quattro, cinque, trying to go to one hundred. And then I start again. I keep counting until I reach the creek that borders the dunes.
I’ve been coming daily to this beach since the first pandemic lockdown two years ago, to find some space, some respite from the fogged-in feeling that descended as the reality of the pandemic set in — the loss, the suffering, the uncertainty of it all.
It was as if the wind, salt, sea and sky, and the tides could carry me through the long, dark COVID winter.
Some days I seek to embrace the cold, relishing the feeling of breathing icy air into my lungs, feeling it sting nose, cheeks and even eyes. The cold makes me feel alive. I want to walk forever as the light fades, taking in the blasts of maritime air.
But today, the walk feels more like a battle. Do I need this struggle? I’m so worried about my fingers freezing I’ve barely looked up at the sky. I keep moving digits, mimicking the piano scales I learned as a child, calling out Italian numbers.
Carry on, I tell myself. Remember the goal: to walk the beach every day in all seasons, no matter the weather.
The cold makes me feel alive. I want to walk forever as the light fades, taking in the blasts of maritime air.
Maybe I’ve set this goal just to prove to myself that I am hardy and resilient. I can take on anything. Helping my dear partner, Eric, who is older and more vulnerable, through the pandemic. Doing the grocery shopping and other household errands, shoveling snow, so that we can be safe.
We are safe. And fortunate to be able to work from home, even as we are separated from family, close friends, colleagues and much of our lives that we once took for granted.
But now I am lost in thoughts, stories, finger exercises. I’m not paying attention to this beach I love and have sought to befriend — even on a frigid day like today, when it’s just me and a few herring and ring-billed gulls.
Then I look up. I see that the sun is sinking behind the dunes.
Suddenly there is a burst of warm light. The sky reddens.
I turn around, and, facing east, see that the shuttered beachside inn, with its fading red clapboards, is bathed in the rosy light. The inn’s chipped white shutters and its carvings in the shape of anchors, are also illuminated.
The sea too: light skips across the waves, touching the nearby island. Warm light floods the entire sky — covering the inn, sea, sand and granite rocks in a blush of redness.
It stops me. Stops all my thoughts.
The light is here in its full glory. Then quickly gone.
The wind has quieted and I can now hear the waves striking the shore and retreating.
The warmth of the late afternoon winter light stays with me, even as the days grow longer and the season yields to spring.
