The Ocean and Why We Can't Stay Away

I've been wondering lately why most of the trips we plan seem to involve the ocean. On one hand, the ocean is totally awesome. There's simply no way to describe the feeling I get when staring out at the vastness of it. To stand on the cusp of the Atlantic and realize that on the other side of it lies Mexico (I have a very American sense of geography) is enough to make one realize just how small they really are.

On the other hand, the ocean is fucking creepy as shit. There are so many ways in which one can die in the ocean, it's enough to keep me out of the water entirely. Sharks? Sting Rays? Jellyfish? Sticks that feel like they might be jellyfish when they rub up against your leg? Rogue waves? Manatee? Who wants to take that kind of risk just for a really big, overly salty body of water? And don't get me started on the sand. Walking is already hard enough. Do I really have to spend my time watching my steps so that I don't step on a vicious crab? Fuck that. There are plenty of lakes in Michigan where the most dangerous thing you have to worry about is Asian carp.

Still, since I got my first taste of it, I haven't been able to resist the allure of the ocean. My family wasn't much for traveling when I was younger. We'd take yearly trips, but they were almost always confined to Michigan. In fact, the furthest outside of Michigan we ever traveled was Ohio and some would say that that is almost worse than not taking a vacation at all. (They would be right. Ohio is a piece of shit.) When I hit my early twenties, I knew that the ocean was something I had to see, if only as a rite of passage as a traveler. Here's a picture of me standing in the ocean for the first time.

That year in Virginia Beach, swimming in the ocean didn't seem to scare me that much. I just assumed that if there were other people in the water, anything that could possibly kill us would probably stay pretty far away. Plus, I have always held out hope that if I spend as much time near the ocean as possible, one day I will meet a dolphin and it will want to be my best friend.

Eventually I did  get to see some dolphins,  and though we did not become best friends, the ocean still seemed like a great vacation destination simply because it was so much different than anything else I was used to. But gradually I began to prefer being near the ocean to actually being in the ocean. There weren't any significant events that triggered this. I have yet to see anything more terrifying than a fish. But after five straight years of ocean trips, I feel like I'm kind  of pushing my luck.  Statistically speaking, in the US  alone, the same amount of people die from ocean related accidents every year as do people that choke on their own vomit. According to my wife, this is something which happens "like, every day".

(Note: No actual evidence was used to support this claim.)

I've slowly moved away from actually enjoying the time I spend in the ocean, to enjoying the time I spend near the ocean. For me, one of the best parts about vacation is using the time you have to reflect on what you've done in the year leading up to vacation and what you want to do with the year that lies in front of you before the next big trip. The perfect place to do this is sitting in front of the ocean. There's nothing like sitting on the beach in the early hours of the morning, staring out at the moon's reflection across the water, listening to the waves crash against the shore. The idea for this very blog sprung up from a late night conversation Turner and I had as we did just that.

Even if it's doing the best that it possibly can to kill me, the ocean still holds an unavoidable allure. Sure, there's a lot more world to explore. Not every trip we take will involve getting drunk on the beach for a week. But for now, there's still something about it that continues to draw me back year after year.  Perhaps it's the call of my future dolphin friend, calling me ever closer. Maybe it's just some fucking manatee waiting to sink his stupid manatee teeth into my neck. But with Vacation '12 at an end, we already know that Vacation '13 will take place somewhere along the Eastern Seaboard.