Entering the water always takes time. For me it’s about loitering at the edge where the water dissolves into sand and getting used to the temperature.

Alongside me four maybe five boys with dark hair play with a ball. The ball is colored like the earth. So clever, why hadn’t I seen one like it before? Players sound Brazilian. Leave it to them to be playing with a soccer ball on the beach in Hawaii. Very cool. I mention this to my friend who says to me there are a lot of Brazilians……he says, “I mean it’s like out of balance” and I say “yes, because Brazil is out of balance”.

Three young girls approaching puberty, just below adolescence, sit crosslegged where the sand is a mirror to the sky after the wave. Elbows akimbo, resting dainty hands on knees raised high. The fingers figuring meditation mudras.

After observing them for less than a minute I see the goal of the game is to try to keep that posture when the wave comes. Gleefully, None of them can do that. As I walk away from them I hear one girl telling… about something But I can’t tell what. So I listen with more attention.

She says, “…you know it’s like when you’re playing hide and seek and you know where someone is hiding but you pretend you don’t know so you don’t have to find them. “It’s like that”, she says and I ponder, what’s like that?

Walking along the beach I see a boy name Noah; actually I see his father first; actually I see the sandcastle first. First and only one on the entire walk along the entire beach. It is spectacularly very well-built. Like a fortress. It has four towers. It is nicely decorated with shells that look like shields and tiny pebbles that look like tiles. A marvelous castle from which to

hear the birds chirping And the waves breaking. I feel the sun go in and out. there is no radio playing to drown out the little laughter that comes along like wisps of sky.

The dips in the sand, especially under the late afternoon of saturated light become footprint puddles mimicking the waves like music in the ocean. Granular Dry yellow sand merges into blues, deep blues and whites.

A bright transparent lime green inter-tube escapes on the wind and skims the water.

On the chair, under the sign, blackened and brunt sparklers rest, left over from the night before.

Going home the windshield wiper reminds me of childhood.