Bubble Bath in the Ocean

Not all scars are bad. In fact, some smile right back at you.

The product of the repeated grinding of shells and sand on what started as a tiny cut, this smile shaped scar below my left ankle evolved over the course of last summer, as my child embraced a new game, and I accepted a new life transition.

Clasped tightly hand in hand, we would run into the white foamy froth, the aftermath of each breaking wave. Sometimes we let ourselves float through it, getting tussled in its chaos. Others, we would stand up tall, a naive attempt to grip elements in constant motion. We got knocked down and smacked around, forcing us to respect that ‘it’ is always more powerful than ‘us.’

Throughout it all, we shrieked and jumped and called out to the horizon, “bubble bath in the ocean, bubble bath in the ocean!” It is in these chaotic, bloody, glorious, spumey ocean baths that the smile emerged, and the paradigm shifted.

For over a decade, I have believed that life’s transitions are akin to being “between the waves.” Clean and organized, sets of six, countable and measurable. Crests and valleys. Currents and breaks. Hypnosis in motion.

But now I realize that floating between peaks and troughs, awaiting the next perfect wave to ride to shore, is too obvious, too linear, too clear. In fact, the only things so precise these days tend to not be real.

Bubble baths, on the other hand, are a product of the same waves, but instead of floating above them, you revel in their underbelly. You stand firm through their textures, embracing their unknowns, all while the currents grasp for your core, pushing you in unfathomable vectors. And inevitably, always right when you think you can relax, an invisible force from hundreds of miles away pulls the last bits of that swell away, just so nature can thrust you a new one. A forceful momentum you can ride, but never control.

The essence of waves is not the space between them, but rather the energy that bubbles throughout them. This bubble bath is life’s game, one of mind and body, of mental endurance and physical tenacity. Tough and often dirty, it requires prowess and patience. The former approach, technology and data optimization can replicate. Bonafide, infinitely dimensional reality like this, only the human soul can survive.

“Bubble baths in the ocean” are the new “between the waves.’ A pattern between holding on and letting go. A tension between fear and safety. A dance between breathing and believing.

As I look down at that smile, I see all the waves it went through to get here. All the layers of skin, sand and salt that transformed agony into ecstasy, blood into bubbles, anxiety into joy. All by being who I am, right now.