The Ocean For a Writer

I want to start this post off by saying that I am not a beach person. It’s not that I dislike it, but I often find the woods or mountains to be more of my cup of tea. So when we left for our annual beach trip last Saturday, I had no intentions of writing this blog post. I had tried and failed to figure out a beach post that I would both enjoy writing and would work for my blog.

And yet here we are. I wrote a blog post about the beach.

Because despite my plans, on the very first night at the beach I knew I would have to pull something together. What caused me to change my mind? Well, I had forgotten how much I loved the ocean. Once I was standing there with my toes in the water, I knew what this week’s blog was going to be about, beach person or not. It just didn’t feel right to not write a post about the ocean!

Something I love about the ocean is the way it always seems to be echoing. The ocean is resounding with memories of all the people who’ve been on its shore, all the stories written in its waves, and the sheer greatness of its Creator. Ever since I started taking my writing seriously I have found the ocean to be the perfect place for thinking up stories, and today I’m going to be writing up my thoughts on why that’s so. But this isn’t just a post for a writer, anyone who loves the ocean will understand what I mean.

Memories

Memories made at the beach are often so unique and so significant that they stand completely alone in people’s minds. Being at the ocean reminds me of all the times I’ve been there in the past, and suddenly, those memories are rushing back to me, faster than the waves themselves.

I think about jumping waves on the shore, which was probably my favorite thing to do in the ocean as a child. Or I think about hunting for sea shells, always seeming to end up with way more than I needed. Or about working to sustain a crumbling castle against the incoming tide, or wading out as far into the water as my mom would let me go, or just standing around eating a snack with my ankles in the water.

Yes, the ocean holds strong memories for me. But it isn’t just me it holds memories for. There are hundreds and hundreds of other people who have memories at the ocean as well. They have memories of wave-jumping, sea shell hunting, and sand castle saving, as well as a million other ones I don’t have.

The memories people make at the beach are unique to each person, just like any other memory. But they are also alike. After all, they are derived from the same, great thing.

When I look around the shore I can’t see all the memories other people have there. But I can see those memories being made. I can watch the little girl in a mermaid swim suit having her toes touched by the ocean for the first time. I can watch the kids playing in the waves, or digging in the sand. There are a million things happening on the shore, things that will be remembered by people whenever they think of the ocean.

These people all will have their own things to remember when they stand on the water’s edge. And although they will differ from the memories I have, they still begin with the ocean. The ocean holds memories for me, and it holds memories for them. It’s like a huge box of memories, storing them for multitudes somewhere in their depths.

Stories

It seems that everything in the ocean holds some story (or a hundred!). Memories are stories after all, and memories are etched in everything. If every object, creature, person, and wave could tell us its story, we could have enough books to fill a library, or three!

Knowing the number of memories made at the ocean I cannot help but think of the stories behind them all. A perfect white shell washed ashore, maybe for the first time, maybe for the hundredth. The sand, all washed up and glittering, laid in new patterns with each wave. The pelicans, swooping over the water, never colliding with the ocean, but touching it perfectly. What is the story behind all of that? Something about the ocean seems to hint at wonderful things and tales, if only they could be told.

There are other stories, too. Stories out of books. Stories about buried treasure, deep sea exploration, and long lost ships. All these stories may be found in the pages of a book, but they can be felt and imagined here at the ocean. And then there are made up stories that have not even made it to the stage of books. Like the ones I think up while looking out over the ocean, and scribble down in my notebook for later. Lots of those stories will never be read, or even told.

Yes, the ocean just might hold even more stories than it does memories. I wish I knew them all. I wish I could pick up a tiny sea shell half buried in the sand and know exactly where it’s been, how many times it’s washed onto this one shore.

But even if I will never know all the stories there are to know, being around so many untold stories is a terribly inspiring location for a writer to be. There seems to be no better source for a story than the great magnificent ocean. It’s a treasure trove of ideas, just waiting to be found and written down, so that at least a few of the many stories of the world will be told.

It’s really no wonder I crave to write a good story after being at the ocean.

Wonder

But there is something even deeper and more meaningful about the ocean than memories or stories. And that is wonder. The ocean is a body of water full of beauty and greatness. No one who visits can deny that, and we can see a reflection of God in its great waters.

Saying that the ocean is big is an understatement. It is enormous, more vast than we could possibly imagine. Its horizon stretches in all directions, to the right and left, and straight beyond us. Somewhere, hundreds of miles on the other side of it there is a country, but we will never be able to see anywhere near it from where we are.

And this great body of water is powerful. It will have its own way. Watch the ocean charge the shore; see how it eats away at the sand. Perhaps there is a sand castle in its path, packed smooth and built strong. It puts up a good fight, dividing the waves and sending them back, away from the castle. The tide has to rush hard and strong to devour the structure, but sooner or later it will be won.

One tumbling wave at a time, the water will eat away at anything in its path. Fighting its way, battling obstacles from the outside and even its own water rushing back to the ocean, it strives. It is wild, dangerous, and mighty. And it will have its own way.

But there is also an order to the chaos. Under the tumult and crashing, there is pattern and rhythm. Waves spill over each other like water poured out of a glass. The tide is lined with shining white. The bubbles group into patterns on the surface of the water. The water weaves over shells, making marks in the sand like a bird in flight. It smooths, it flattens, and it returns to order.

When you are at the ocean you are in the presence of something amazing. It is too great and too beautiful to be described. And yet this thing is just a small glimpse at what it is as a whole, and an even smaller glimpse at the God who created it.

Final Thoughts

I’m so inspired after visiting the ocean. It has given me a rush of excitement for my stories, and awe for my God. I hope this post gave you a fresh love for the ocean just like the one I got while visiting there.

Have you ever been to the ocean? How did you feel when you were there?