Spirituality Column: Salty Life

I don’t remember where I first saw one, 15 years ago or more. No reason to recall; some impressions have to add up before they draw interest. By the hundredth or so, I wondered what the scrawly decals on rear windows said. So, I walked up to an SUV for a squint. In letters formed as if written by a finger dipped in an ocean wave, it spelled “Salt Life.”

Ah, yes. I knew immediately what it meant. Light, loose clothes; walks on wet sand; the kiss of sun and evening breezes; fresh-caught seafood suppers; the moon rising out of the sea. The mental pictures set hooks and reel us in. Few of us could permanently relax into residence in coastal communities, but we remember our visits and dream of returning. Some display a souvenir to declare their citizenship there.

I’m bemused these days when I spot one where I live deep in the Interior. The trend peaked a while ago, yet the decals are still to be seen here, a long day’s drive from any salt water. How many of my neighbors, I wonder, manage most of the year while enduring a soft grief that they get to enjoy their most real, vivid lives for just a week or two?

I count myself in the class. Your best life is whatever floats your boat, but what floats mine — or rolls my bike, rather — is bicycle touring. If my Outback’s behind sported a sticker, it would state “Bike Life.” Which I can access more easily than making a trip to the beach, I admit. But I can’t tour 52 weeks a year.

I don’t want to have to go on vacation — that is, “vacate” my everyday existence — to feel most alive. I don’t want to have to ask for “leave” to do it. Evoking separation seems very strange when what I seek is to be present, centered, awake, aware, more sensuously, sharply alive.

What would do it for you? What do you wish you did every day that ends in a “Y?” Granted that what weighs us down is real and might very well be heavy, what would set your spirit free to fly? If it’s a salty life you want, what would put its taste in your mouth?

Maybe it’s that, by getting a little distance from them, cares are left behind. Perhaps we could grow a bit better at letting go of the cares we don’t care about. Maybe it’s the remembered quality of light reflected from sea and sand. Well, let’s open our eyes to see the many shifting shades under the canopy of leaves in the wood. Maybe it’s sitting next to the vast mystery of the ocean. So, let’s find her as we snuggle up to the ocean in our blood.

Wherever the sun rises on us, whatever day today is, it’s a day ending in a “Y.” There’s no time to waste. If it takes our tears at what we have denied ourselves to make it start to be salty, let us weep. And let joy come in the morning, wherever it dawns.

The Reverend Doug Job does interim ministry for congregations in transition and keeps good memories and friends made while serving a church in Cape. At present, he lives in Hannibal, Mo., where he has too many bicycles he doesn’t ride often enough. You may toss salt at him at revdarkwater@gmail.com.