Lockdown is loosening, we are soon going to be able to travel again. And whilst I love exploring new places, by the sea, the lure is more about being a family beside the sea, than the salt on my skin and new adventures.
That sounds silly, I realise, as we already are a family by the sea, but a few things have changed over the last couple of years. The most significant being the ages of my children. Now both in their late teens, one no longer lives at home and the other would rather be dead than be seen on the beach with his mum and dad. And then of course there has been Covid.
I look back on my childhood family holidays by the sea with great affection and fondness. They were an integral part of our family life. The building blocks of who I have become. There’s a whole lot of writing to be had on my memories of family time on the shores of West Sussex but this is my children’s story. Not mine. When I became a mother and we became a family, holidays on the coast were an unsaid certainty. As well as meeting my children’s basic needs, I wanted to provide my children with lasting memories, a constant supply of joyful happy times doing everything and nothing by the sea. I have no particular talents or gifts to bestow on them via nature or nurture but I have an insatiable curiosity for everything and anything to do with the beach and the sea. My biggest wish as a mother was for them to wonder, to encourage their inquisitive minds, to guide them to care for the beaches and seas that would form the backdrop of our bonding. As they grow in their own directions, less malleable, less influenced by parental persuasion I wonder if their souls remain salty.
My eldest now resides in the USA, as a university student. She is in landlocked Iowa. She has settled in well but has moments when she desperately misses home. Desperately misses the sea. She asks us to send her regular clips of Brighton’s famous seafront. We share the storms with her when the waves invade the prom and throw pebbles high into the air. We share quiet sunrises and ‘best in show’ winter sunsets and of course our resident seaside starlings. These images of home lift her sprits and fill her tank until she returns in the holidays. I have a little glass jar containing all her sea glass finds from her first lifeguarding season. Every time it catches my eye, from its place on my bedroom chest of drawers, I smile. Her happy place is my happy place the jar is a visual reminder of this.
When she returned for Christmas, the first thing we did was walk on the shingle looking for sea glass, shells and pebbles. The next was to paddle board taking in the Hove vista. We even spent a night in Suffolk exploring the beaches of the North Sea together. These were her suggestions, her desire. Of course I am always going to be a willing partner when anyone suggests those activities but it’s so much sweeter when it’s your kid. Your grown up kid to boot. She is a Beach Lifeguard and a Surf Life Saving Coach now, something I am immensely proud of. But more than that, I am acutely full of pride when I see her at work on he beach picking up litter on quiet days and encouraging others to enjoy the sea safely and responsibly on busy days. She has become it’s custodian. I literally couldn’t wished for anything more.
Whilst my daughters affinity with the sea is obvious, my sons is hidden under layers of angst, self consciousness and acts of rebellion. But it is there. Of this I am sure. He once spat at me in anger ” I’m not like you, I hate the beach and the sea” when I tried to coax him out of the house and onto the shingle. Full of rage he said those words purposefully knowing they would hurt my heart. But it didn’t have the impact he desired as I know it’s just not true. In my lounge I have a photo of him standing on top of a large sand dune at Penbryn beach in Wales. His arms are outstretched as he inhaled the salty air. The snarly kid that was a toe rag to get out of the house was transformed before our eyes into the boy we know he can be. He once found a washed up fishing tray on the beach at Praa Sands, filled it with beach combing finds and sat in it for hours, refusing to even come out for food, so he ate his dinner in it. I can close my eyes and be transported back to that exact day and time. I can picture his freckled nose, his new Year 6 haircut sun bleached around the edges. His enormous grin with teeth that are still too big for his face.
My Son has recently turned 16 and would, under normal circumstances be taking his GCSE exams in a few months time. During this difficult age and difficult times we’ve not been a whole unit, as one child, his confidant, is missing and we’ve not been able to partake in our family rituals. Up to 3 times a year we holiday in the UK. Normally the rugged coast line of the South West or Wales. After being locked away in our own worlds, work and bedrooms, we come back together by the sea. There’s a great freedom in the the ‘holiday’ seaside for him. No risk of bumping into his mates. Far away from his friends he loses his inhibitions. Being by he sea facilitates the opportunity for my boy to really be himself. His curious, fun loving, adventurous self. The self that is in all of us if we allow it the blue space and time to emerge from time to time. And holidays by the sea are a great way to do this.
I perform best as a parent by the sea on holiday. Being a parent is the job that we never feel we do well at. Always self critical of our parental choices and abilities. As a mother that suffers from depression and anxiety, who struggles to disguise all the behaviours attributed to this illness, my children seeing me at my best is something I purposeful try to orchestrate. My role as their protector, although wanting them to experience the diversity of human kind, it needs to be peppered with simple joyful behaviours demonstrated by their closest role model. Me. By the sea and particularly on holiday, I am the best mum I can be. My children bear witness to my enchantment as we arrive and we race to the beach before even unpacking the car. They see me jump into cold clear water screeching with joy. They see me smile as I pick up finds and treasures from the shore. They see me unwind as we travel ever further, waiting for who will be the first one to see the sea and call it out. All of this ‘perfect’ parenting is of course lubricating with lots of late nights, ice cream, chips and sometimes new surfboards. And a total escape from household chores and work. I have purposefully cultivated a connection between them and seaside places encouraging a life long love affair with the solace that can be found there.
But recent events have robbed of us of our holiday rituals. And whilst the world stood still my children did not. One left home and the other embarked on his final year of school. These have been left unmarked as important events and transitions in our lives, unable to express joy or sorrow, or reinforce our identity as a foursome without our treasured time together by the sea. Our seaside holidays give us, and our children, a sense of security, identity and belonging. They have ben needed now more than ever to make them feel safe during uncertain and changing times. We forgo luxury for tents and caravans the motivation being just being together. We are entering uncharted seas. How to remain a family without our traditional seaside holiday.
One of our most treasured traditions is visiting a certain secret cove in Cornwall. Every time we visit we write messages on rocks and hide them in the granite walls of the small fishing slipway there. We planned to do this, possibly for the last time, last Spring. Sadly Covid arrived before we could leave and this tradition could not be completed before we became a three. Missing out on this precious bonding time, for a while, left me bereft. I realise how privileged that sounds but the simple truth is I could handle most of the restrictions placed upon us all over the last 12 months but I ached for time together, away from our urban beach for what was likely to be the last time. And now that restrictions are lifting, we are missing one.
So we adapt, we have no choice. Adaptation in inevitable as your children grow and your family unit changes. But I know the salty bond is still there. I trust that the foundations that we have laid will remain long into the future and will continue to fuel family jokes and stories. I have seen glimpses over the last year, enough to fill my cup. We’ve kayaked and paddled at the meanders. Walked along the river and accompanied by a seal. Spent Christmas morning rock pooling. Raced across the sand with the dog. My daughters Christmas gift is a couple of nights away, by the sea, when she is home for the summer. My son is keen to visit his grandparents, when lockdown lifts, in the Easter holidays on the IOW where seaside tradition was born. These rare days out replacing our family seaside holidays. Not always the full four. But enough to reinforce the bond.
We hope to get away to a caravan in Devon as a four in the summer. When I announced this two my children, one in person and one via facetime, the response was overwhelming smiles. The connection was clear the bond still holding. To put it in my daughter’s words ‘ I miss our family holidays’. It remains interwoven into our lives, binding us together even when we are not.
Pass the Salt 