On a visit to favourite Grandparents at the coast, we went for a family 'Good Friday' stroll along the shore. Calm, unruffled late morning, grey watercolour sea blurred into its identical sky. Gentle intake and sigh of waves, the stark darkened bones of the old groynes reaching out from the beach ("dinosaur spines!"), a young couple in black (black for such a Spring day?!) kissing perched on the newer concrete maritime wall. Seaweed aroma on the breeze. Two dogs reciprocately chasing tails in a perfect circular dance. A mound of stones piled to form a campfire in the adjacent field, the mustard spread of rapeseed blooms across the landscape beyond. My son, small figure resolutely forging ahead on his first wooden bike, my little girl in flowery skirt and leggings progressing in zigzags on her little pink scooter along the path - step, whizz, step, whizz, step step whizzz. I climbed to the top of a mound - tide break - to embrace the view through my designer sunglasses. A young (handsome!) man, cycling past below, smiled and quipped: "Don't jump! It's not worth it!" The seascape hummed in the midday silence. The sun warm on my cheeks. I watched all my loves frolicking, three figures, and thought: "Could it ever get better than this?" And, "Do you need the career, the power, the glory? Is this not enough?" And: "Rhetorical question..."
Then my son waved, my daugher called in her little high sweet voice, and I slotted right back into the day's gentle lull.
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