#22
Blue Marlin Beach sits at the end of a walkway from the parking lot, but we usually have to park further away. The path moves through some pine trees, sweet and sticky with resin that reminds you - it’s not tropical – it’s Mediterranean.
At the bar, girls make coffee in plastic cups, kids buy ice cream and popsicles, adults drink spritz and eat potato chips. The sun is hot, the sand burns your feet, the water can be soupy or crystal clear – or both, in the same day.
I like the heat, I like the sun. I like they way it makes me feel. The cold and grey isn’t for me, not for long anyway.
I read about Hydra, about Taormina, about Gela. I read about Formentera and Tropea. I read about Bari, Lesbos, about Crete. Tunisia. Palma. I read and read and remember the feeling of prickly hot, dry sun. Of salt caked to my back, my arms. To the color of my eyes in the mirror after washing off the sea, contrasted to my dark skin. To the feeling of being clean, clean of humidity, clean of dirt, of disease, of maladies.
The first time she brought me here, it was winter. There was no one, except a few souls walking their dogs along the fog grey water. It smelled like metal.