The Beach Ritual
The sweet art of waiting for Sara, one summer morning at a time.
The beach has never been just a destination for us; it is our sanctuary. But getting there was never a simple matter of grabbing keys and walking out the door. It is a recurring, perfectly orchestrated morning ritual — a familiar private comedy we both know by heart and play with identical relish every single summer.
I usually stand outside leaning against the warm hood of the car, keys jingling between my fingers, caught between mild impatience and an inevitable grin. First comes her voice drifting through the open second-floor window, long before Sara herself appears. Then she leans out over the stone sill, squinting against the Mediterranean glare. “Which sunglasses, Juraj?” she calls down. “The new tortoiseshell ones, or the classic black?”
“Take both,” I shout back with the practical wisdom of a man who knows better than to offer a single choice. “And grab the high-SPF cream while you’re at it — you know your shoulders burn in five minutes.” She sighs, rolls her eyes playfully, and turns back into the room. But just before disappearing behind the sheer curtain, she leans out one last time with that unmistakable, dangerous little spark in her tone: “I’m packing the red swimsuit too… you remember? The one from that night?”
A single sentence, and years collapse in an instant. Suddenly I’m not just standing by a dusty car in the driveway; I’m back on that dark stretch of sand under a black sky, where everything between us first caught fire, and where we quietly agreed that whatever storms were coming, we’d ride them out together. “Bring it,” I call back, my voice dropping an octave. “You know damn well that one’s my favorite.”
From inside comes the hurried thud of her steps and a muffled shout: “Coming down! Give me literally one minute!”
✍︎ What the Waiting Taught Me“With Sara, even the waiting feels like living.”
— leaning against the car, Juraj ❦
I check my watch and lean back against the car, smiling to myself. I know “one minute” means twenty at the very least. But out here in the sun, with the engine quiet and the scent of pine and salt already in the air, there is nowhere else on earth I’d rather wait.
One minute always means twenty. And somehow, that’s exactly right.
Leave a Reply