WAVES

There is something healing in the crashing of the ocean.  When my last nerve is frayed, I get an overwhelming longing to go to the beach.  All I want is to be standing ankle deep in water, watching my cares wash out to sea with every swell and fall of the salty waves.   When faced with the vast ocean, the cumbersome loads I carry are swiftly diminished to something more realistic.  A bulky package of anxiety is suddenly recognizable as a tiny parcel of slight inconvenience.  Life lens focus gets readjusted, and the big picture is so overwhelming it becomes clear that my worries are just a tiny speck of sand.  The waves are my witness.  I breathe in deeply and with each breath out, I am lighter.  My feet sink into the wet sand and the baggage of stress just melts away.  There is nothing like it.

My memory of that therapeutic water was the driving force behind a last minute decision to head to the shore.  Jim and Isaac were working so Aubrey and I decided to go it alone.  I had been a passenger on countless beach excursions during my 45 years.  It was only a two hour trip.  How hard could it be?  I looked for a New Jersey map and despite the fact that I KNOW we own at least three and have a box of other maps large enough to wallpaper our entire house, I could not find one.  We left with only a Pennsylvania map in hand. 

We were less than a mile from the house when we met with the first nuisance.  We’ve all seen baggies.  I’ve got boxes and boxes of them in my kitchen.  All sizes.  I was not-so-recently introduced to some unbelievably large clear sacks for blankets, or really any household item you might want to store.  There is actually a plug by which you suck out all the air.  Very tricky.  It’s a game just seeing how much you can stuff inside.  But NEVER have I seen a plastic bag like the one that tried to swallow the rental car I was driving on the morning of the beach trip.  It arrived on a southwesterly wind and attempted to wrap itself around the entire front portion of our fat white Buick Lucerne.  I can only imagine what sorts of things one could preserve in a baggie the size of that floating menace.  Gymnasium bleachers, adolescent elephants, dining rooms, or sectional sofas….  I was at once acutely aware of what it must be like to be vacuum packed.  About the time I started to shriek, the front right tire got the best of Mr. Plastic, and we were free.  In the rearview mirror I saw the synthetic ghost rising up behind us, preparing its tendrils for the next victim. 

Well, that was weird, but we were not disheartened.  We traveled on to the bank, where I had an inordinate amount of trouble with simple tasks like remembering my checking account number, filling out banking slips, and keeping my wallet from dropping repeatedly onto the floor.  Aubrey was amused by my lack of dexterity and smug as she located a bubble gum flavored lollipop and deposited almost as much money as I was withdrawing.  Little miser. 

We decided on the Lansdale entrance to the turnpike, and we were on our way.  Aubrey, now 12, was riding shotgun.  Holding the internet directions, she was in charge of navigation.  An important lesson was learned.  When the directions tell you to “head to route 476 toward 276,” they are not telling you to proceed to 276.  When your daughter reads you that particular sentence as you happen to be passing the turnoffs for route 276, you should not, as if by reflex, twitch suddenly to the right causing the rental car to head in completely the wrong direction as you follow 276 instead of 476.  Before realizing the full error of my overreaction to the spoken directions, I saw that I could go left toward Harrisburg or right toward New Jersey.  Well of course I chose New Jersey – I was going to the beach, after all…. It took very little time to realize that I had made a very wrong turn on an expressway.  I was now traveling toward the Fort Washington exit of the turnpike.  If you know

where I live, then you know that this is the exit which ends up practically in my back yard….  “But oh!  Look there!”  A sign for the northeast extension!  I could go back the way I’d come and just begin again.  With another sudden jerking motion, I foolishly opted to send us back in the direction of Lansdale instead of shortening the trip like a rational person. 

Well, I was disgusted with this unfortunate turn of events, but Aubrey remained cheerful.  Indeed, it was her cheer that convinced me (at first) that this was no big deal.  However, when we passed the sign touting 2 miles to Lansdale, I asked my navigator to read for me the ‘toll amount due’ on the turnpike card.   She expertly informed me that there was no toll amount due on the Lansdale line….Only two little dots….   I became a bit nervous.  What would happen when we arrived at the toll booth?  I suggested, “Well, maybe they’ll have pity on us.”  And without missing a beat, my dear daughter responded with certainty and not a little disgust.  “I would….” 

It was then I began hysterically laughing.  I know it wasn’t funny at all, but it struck a chord in me, resulting in some pretty snorty guffaws.  But along with my

amusement was the rising apprehension about the approaching tollbooth.  I did what I always do when I am feeling uncertain.  I phoned my husband. 

Poor Jim was standing outside the conference room trying to go into a meeting when he got my call.  Upon hearing his voice and attempting to share my tale of misdirection while choking on my frantic laughter, I began to cry.  It was a pitiful display, one which rendered me completely unintelligible.  I was obviously more upset about the navigational error than I had realized. I sobbed and laughed my story into the cell phone as the tears rolled down my face and I tried to steer the rental car while visually impaired by the moisture accumulating on my face.  Jim listened attentively and when I paused long enough to let him get a word in edgewise, he calmly responded, “Brenda, I didn’t understand a single word you just said.”  I tried again, with barely more success, and had to hang up because the tollbooth was by this time imminent.  Blowing my nose and applying my largest sunglasses, I waited in line for my turn.  The gentleman put out his hand for my card and payment.  I handed him my card, an apologetic $20.00 bill, and I tried to explain that I had just wasted 30 minutes.  He looked at my card, and he looked back at me.  He was incredulous.  “HOW did you do this?”  I told him I had followed signs for 276 though I should have followed signs for 476, and he stared

at me in disbelief.  Finally, not knowing what on earth to do with me, he dismissed me with “I believe you, just GO.”  And then because I wasn’t moving away fast enough for him, he added, “It’s free.”  I am quite sure he just wanted to be rid of my puffy eyes and my sorry tale.  I have no doubt that the dinner table discussion at Mr. Tollbooth’s house included the stupid redhead in the Buick. 

We circled back and almost effortlessly made it all the way across the Ben Franklin Bridge before the next navigational uncertainty sent us deep into the heart of Camden.  There was construction everywhere and cement barricades which inhospitably prevented lost females from pulling off to the side of the road to reconnoiter.  We finally spotted a gas station and stopped to buy ourselves a New Jersey map so we could figure out where in the world we had gone wrong.   Walking into the ‘store’, we saw nothing but an empty countertop and a lot of dust.  There were a few warm soda bottles and a couple of empty racks too.  Thinking we had arrived on moving day, we were heading back to the car when the barely understandable gas station attendant started following me to ask what I was doing.  I told him I was searching for a map of New Jersey.  With a thick accent he declared, “I have map. Five dollar.”  He reached into his magical dusty rack and

somehow came up with exactly what I was looking for.  I gave him five dollar and didn’t ask any questions.

Map in hand, we soon figured out that if we stayed the course on our current road, we would eventually connect with the Atlantic City Expressway; and we were very happy to see the sign when we found it.  Traveling along on the expressway, we were pleased as punch.  At this point, there was no way to go wrong.  As long as we followed that very straight road until it stopped, we’d be at the coast and could figure out our beachcombing plan from there. 

But then we started to notice that all of the exits from the expressway had an annoying common trait.  After detailing the location, the signs said EXACT CHANGE.  Oh dear.  Do we HAVE any change?  We scrambled to assemble all of the change in our purses and glove box and came up with exactly 35 cents between us.  By the time we discovered this coin problem, the passing tolls had already climbed to 50 cents.  We had dollars, but no change.  Again anxiety reared its annoying head.  (Neither of us flies very well by the seat of our pants.)  We started trying to think of alternative plans.  Aubrey was all for the idea of scrunching a dollar bill into the machine, but I had a sinking suspicion that dollar-scrunching

was not a plausible scheme.   We determined that we would stop at the nearest rest stop and purchase whatever we had to purchase in order to come up with enough change to make our pockets jingle.

We were ever so proud of ourselves when we bought chicken strips at one shop and asked for a dollar in change; and then as icing on the cake, bought chocolate covered raisins at another shop and asked for a second dollar in change.  We were JINGLING and feeling self-satisfied in our brilliance.  It was only a mile or two after our clever rest stop when we exited the expressway.  The toll amount charged was $2.00.  Exact change at our exit was not required.

Once the ocean was in sight, our traveling trauma paid off.  It was a beautiful day.  The water temperature was perfect and the waves performed their magic on my frazzled nerves.   We walked on the beach for hours and then de-sanded with baby powder and walked on the boardwalk for several more hours.  We gorged ourselves on all our favorite seaside treats.  Salt water taffy, boardwalk fries, polish water ice, Mack and Manco pizza, Johnson’s caramel popcorn, and chocolate covered macaroons. 

Aubrey the animal lover was dismayed by the signs suggesting that we not feed the wildlife.  She intentionally ‘dropped’ some potato chips on the beach and was soon a sea gull magnet, just as she had planned.  When we exited one of the boardwalk shops, there were lots of seagulls circling overhead.  One of us commented on the danger of being south of a seagull, and not two seconds later I was screaming, “I’m hit!”  Sure enough, a dim seagull emptied itself on my poor sun-freckled arm and hand.  Thank heaven I come equipped with cleaning wipes.  The incident with the

winged rat did, however, manage to curb my boardwalk snacking as I deemed myself unsanitary.  Aubrey found the bird calamity to be quite entertaining, but apparently her glee was nothing compared to the enjoyment my husband and son experienced when she relayed the story to each of them via telephone.

We were not directionally challenged on the way home.  We opted to use the Fort Washington exit of the turnpike.  I didn’t think I could face seeing the Lansdale tollbooth one more time and  I was admittedly a little afraid the same guy would be working and would find it necessary to point me out to his fellow toll takers. 

You’d think by now I would realize that the world doesn’t actually revolve around me, and the guy may not have even recognized me without my giant sunglasses and blotchy face.  There are bigger issues in the world than crazy women in rental cars.

It was, after all, a perfect day at the beach.  Even the sea gull didn’t manage to ruin my newly acquired relaxation.  I got to stand in the sand.  And the restorative sea has carried away all of my superfluous paraphernalia.  At least for today.