The Jesus Waves
Ice Cream, Pilgrimage, Staying Put
Mandylion & The Holy Thorn, Heather Pollington
Dear friends, glad to find you here. I find myself in Canada. I am contemplating the Pacific for a few days in the midst of my teaching tour. I wrote this seven days ago, back in the olde-country, gazing on another stretch of water entirely.
(A warm and expressive day for men on Salt Spring Island yesterday. We dived into Gawain & The Green Knight and notions of decency, trouble and redemption. Last tickets on an evening for all in Duncan this Wednesday here: To Fall Beautifully From the Edge of the World. )
Photos: Ian MacKenzie
Another response to the Merrie here. From our own Katie Andraski. If you have one, please do leave a link in the comments, I’m nourished by reading them.
I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by;
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.
Sea-Fever, verse .1, John Masefield
I sit on the beach reading The Soul After Death by Father Seraphim Rose* and I decide to do a likely very un-Fr Rose thing. I buy a massive rum and raisin ice cream with a chocolate flake stuck on the top. I can’t wait to eat it. But I don’t. Because suddenly a seagull swooped and flew off with it. Had Fr Rose suddenly taken bird-form? Had he saved me from own gluttonous nature? Was it an angel? We will never know.
I go to the sea because I was born by the sea. I’m always circling back. I also go to the sea because it’s the only place I can’t hear the relentless, shrieking tinnitus I’ve had for thirty years now. Damage from rock ’n’ roll volume – nothing nuanced – and so much harder to fix. I don’t go to the little Arcadian sea-spots my friends visit a little further down the coast, I like to go to the beaches I grew up on. This is going to involve ancient concrete steps covered in seaweed, drunk people, the aforementioned seagulls, foreign accents, sun lotion, nutty little dogs roving around and countless, shimmering waves. The odd combination is a memory-propellant because, unlike most things, it’s exactly as I remember it as a kid. I like that. I can live with the mess. Anything too pristine I struggle with.