Tradition

The sidewalk wasn’t quite straight.  It listed a little to the right. His feet carried him along it as he thought about how the builders who made this sidewalk planned it to do this. Everything that was built was planned. One way or another. All those people who planned all these buildings were children once. They had been little kids too. They had had birthday parties, proms, girlfriends, houses, TV shows, favorite cereals. They all had first grade, second grade, sixth grade, gym. They all had people they liked. People who they didn’t like. People who didn’t listen to them. People who they thought had been for them. They had went to college. They had had a hard time concentrating. He had a hard time concentrating. His mind wandered. So he matched his brain and his feet. His hands plunged into his pockets; the cold couldn’t get to them there.

The sky had been clouded for sometime. It made the grass greener, he thought. If only there was some other way to really appreciate it. The sand was darker though. Maybe that’s why it seemed greener. Iceberg plants always looked like green potato wedges.  His feet stopped. Too much sand to walk in his shoes. He looked back. There never was a line where the concrete stopped and the sand began. There was always some sand on the concrete. Even on the stairs. No place was pure.

His toes dug into the flesh like sand. He had been here before. He’d seen this ocean. The white tips of waves had always peaked out at him. The blue water had always had a cold look to it. He dwelt over his life. This ocean had been here when he was child. When he had gone to kindergarten, the waves had lapped against this beach. When he was in junior year of high school, these rocks had been here. Those plants had been there last year. He knew that as he looked out at the horizon, that the sun would set every day. The light would always make a fan shape on the water, right as the sun kissed the water and would illuminate the clouds with brillant pink and yellow highlights. It had done that since the dawn of time. It would continue to do that. Nothing that he did, big or small changed that. The problem was, everyone already knew that. He wasn’t special. He had been here before, but so had everyone else. This sand had erased all other footprints with the waves. The waves continued to wash everything away...

You should get on with it.
Put on your shoes.
Go back up the stairs.
Go home.

Live.