When I think of summer, this is what comes to my mind...

Hot sun-baked whitish sands on a beach. Its only hot on the first two inches of sand. Under that, it is cool and soothing. Walking barefoot, and there is no other way to walk on a beach, it is best to dig your feet straight away to that cool layer. If not, then walk that line where the water licks the sand. In gentle caresses, the water washes over your feet and erases your foot prints as though you never walked there at all; A secret between you and the beach. With gulls floating in the breezes over the water, crying out to one another in there own distinct language, you can walk in a not so straight line for hours without uttering a word. Alone or with a close friend, the beach gives you a feeling of serenity. A chance to exist on the bridge between land and water; Where mother nature openly wears the shrouds of her two greatest bodies. She is grand and she makes it so easy to feel grand along with her.

The hot sand looses its heat when the sun sets but begins to glow softly beneath the bright moon. In the moon lit darkness, the beach takes on a different feeling. It grows larger. The water becomes mysterious. The sounds of the waves dancing with the shore seems louder then during the day. There is a feeling of invisibility when one walks the beach at night. Holding hands with another the walking becomes more playful. The water always feels warm and the sand cool. Walking the beach is nice at night but the true wonder is to lay in the sand close to the water and peer into the endless night sky. The stars are so great in number; Some tiny little specks of light, others shine fiercely. Not a piece of the sky is without random patterns of radiant beauty. To lay beneath those stars and watch the sky is grounding. It gives the watcher a clear idea how small we really are in the universe. A shooting star streaks across the night and you make a wish. A childish belief, wishing on a star, but it is hard to resist wishing, so we wish anyway. To lay cupped by the the sands while hearing the music of water meeting land and blanketed by the star filled sky, there is no better place to fall to sleep. For me the dreams that come are deep and moving and when I wake, I am more refreshed, more recharged, then if I slept in finest of beds man could make.

The beach, it is the greatest of places to experience summer. There is no place like it. Like I said, when I think of summer, this is what comes to my mind.

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