Wrangler Dani

Writer, editor, wife, adoptive mama and cowgirl living in beautiful Central Oregon.

In Which I Fall Down and Get Seaweed in Unexpected Places

Warning: This is an embarrassing story, I’m actually not sure why I’m telling it. If you want to keep an image of me as being a cute beach chick with perfect hair on her hibiscus-flowered surfboard, read no further.

Yesterday my Hot and Godly fiance and I went to the beach. I LOVE THE BEACH. I love the feeling of the warm sand under my feet, I love falling asleep to the waves, I love the stickiness of salt on my skin after a dip, I love body-surfing, trying to really surf, and trailing my fingers in the water on a long kayak paddle.

My problem is that I have selective memory. I love getting in the water, but when I first put my toes in, IT’S ALWAYS SO FREAKING COLD. I’m standing with my feet barely in the water, feeling goosebumps rising and starting to lose my nerve, when Adam comes up from behind and gives me a sopping-wet, salty, FREEZING hug. Now I’m really losing my nerve.

But, I’m already kinda wet, and it does look inviting… so finally I take a deep breath and dive under a wave. It’s cold but awesome, and I’m feel buoyant and free and so glad I let Adam talk (hug) me into getting in. We swim and play for a while, and I finally get too cold for comfort and decide to head in to shore. Adam goes in ahead of me, and he’s standing on the beach when this happens: an unduly large shorebreak wave slams into my back with surprising force and I’m knocked into the gravelly beach and seaweed strands, feeling very undignified in all of three feet of churning water.

The wave leaves as quickly as it came, and I pull myself up and jog onto the beach, hesitantly feeling the grit in my hair and trying to smile nonchalantly at Adam, who is sort of getting a gigantic kick out of this whole thing.

“Um…” he says, looking me up and down, “You kinda have stuff.”

“Yeah,” I say, trying to look cool and calm and surfer-chick-ish “I got sand all over me.”

“No, you have… a weed.”

He points, and I definitely have a stalk of seaweed, protruding from my bikini bottom in a very unlady-like way. “You better go clean out your pants, ” he says matter-of-factly, and I rush back into the water, this time with ZERO hesitation.

6 comments found

  1. I felt this same way at the beach in San Clemente, only the waves were relentless and kept tossing me around. . . when I finally got out of the tug-of-war (thank you, Adam, for pulling me up!), I realized I had more rocks inside my suit then were left on the beach!! 🙂

  2. I felt this same way at the beach in San Clemente. The waves were relentless and kept tossing me around. . . when I finally got out of the wave tug-of-war (thank you, Adam, for pulling me up!), I realized I had more rocks inside my suit then were left on the beach!! 🙂

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