To Be One with the Sea (Για να είναι ένα με τη θάλασσα = Gia na eínai éna me ti thálassa)

- Do you see that large and dark stripe beyond the lights ahead?

- Yes, I do.

- That’s the sea.

- Oh, dear. I love the sea… I feel so at home when I’m close to the ocean…

- I will take you there one of these days. It’s a promise…

I was looking out of the window to the glimmering city lights, not so distant from where we were staying. The late autumn evening was pretty cold, so we decided not to go out, for obvious and also for not so obvious reasons. He was standing behind me and I did not know exactly what he was up to until I heard the next thing he said.

- This one song is dedicated especially to you…

He put it to play from the notebook computer on top of a small desk placed on one of the corners of the living room. He had chosen a song especially to be the soundtrack of that moment and had bestowed it to me. I was flattered, not only by his spontaneous gesture, but by the beauty and harmony of the tune.

Still standing by the window and looking out beyond the city lights through the double layered glass, I did not move away. He stepped closer to where I was and embraced me from behind. I closed my eyes, listening to the music playing softly in the ambience and felt the warmth of his body getting even closer to mine. His hands caressed the bare skin underneath my sleeveless tee-shirt and I was already experiencing the heated blood flowing through my veins down to a certain part of my body.

He carefully kissed a sensitive known spot behind my ear. A chill went down my spine in an immediate reaction and he laughed at the sensation his fingertips experienced. His lips were soft and warm when they affectionately touched my neck less than a second later. He gently turned my body around with his strong arms and made me face him straight and look deep into his hazel eyes.

I was emotionally touched not only by the sweet strange female voice singing passionately - the Greek words I could not understand properly – but also for the way his tender touch made me feel that moment. It was then that he noticed my eyes were wet.

I detected a kind of oddness in his stare when he glimpsed the sign of tears, but we did not say a single word. He just kissed my eyebrows, my front, my face and my lips. His kiss was as soft and gentle as snowflakes falling down from the sky and landing on the surface of my skin, except that they were warmer.

He rubbed his cheek onto mine very lightly and I felt the peculiar sensation of the contact of his almost harsh unshaved beard. He then tasted my lips very slowly, touching them with his own. The tip of his tongue carefully tasted my slightly open mouth, smoothly forcing its way through to find the tip of mine ready and waiting for his.

I felt as if I was going to faint – my senses left me completely. His strong arms were around me and held me while I let myself be kissed by that man who I met first time not long before and who instinctively knew already so much of how to make me surrender to his delicate infatuation. I felt our bodies, legs and arms entangled into each other’s and I quietly whispered in his ear:

- Take me now, my sweetest friend. I want to be yours and yours only in this right moment.

He just said:

- I am ready for you, my dear. Maybe I have always been...

I closed my eyes and he took the lead and control over the situation like an authentic master. His strength was irrefutably tender. He was patient from the beginning and I interpreted that as a sign of careful consideration and interest towards my body reactions, which he seemed to be studying warily and attentively. He was unquestionably evaluating my senses... slowly... watchfully... kind-heartedly.

I allowed myself to be touched, smelled, kissed and tasted... endlessly... as if my body was his playground and at the same time his testing field.

While his fingertips made their way exploring every little inch of my skin, I was burning in lust and felt my whole body blooming like a flower. My muscles tensed a bit when his contact became stronger and his mouth started its way kissing in between my thighs. I bent my head behind and arched my upper body in an uncontrolled movement, entirely abandoned to his skilled mastery. He put his arms around my waist and heaved my body bonding it to his. I laced my arms around his neck and kissed him passionately.

His mouth was as hungry for mine as mine was for his. His muscles hardened when I made my way from his mouth to his neck, down to his chest and then to his stomach. His body was lean and muscular, not excessively, but extremely handsome to my eyes and touch... my own wonderland to play on and in for that moment and onward...

I stopped a while to stare at the manly beauty of his whole body. He was ready... and so was I.

***

- I feel so at home in your arms and in your body. Did I ever say how much I like your body, my dearest?

He lied down on his back, his shiny deep hazel eyes half closed and he seemed quite relaxed. His grin was gorgeous and his face handsomely masculine. His hands were still lightly placed on the curve of my hips as if he was afraid I was going to fly away from his grasp. Part of my body was still resting over his and my fingers were distractively playing with his chest hairs.

His statement made me feel so good and although his question was still unanswered, I did not say anything, just let a silly giggle come out and kissed him again, bringing his body closer to mine in a rather clumsy embrace. He smiled, moaned slightly and encircled his arms around me for the hundredth time that night. I just let myself go on riding the waves of his sweet yearn once again...

We ended up sleeping like lovers in the arms of one another with my back spoon-clenched in his warm body.

***

“λιμάνι για ν΄ αράξεις             (You reach for the port

περίμενες τον άνεμο                And wait for the wind

μαζί του να πετάξεις “ *          To fly with it)

*(free translation from “Να `σουν θάλασσα” by John Kalpouzos & Christopher Germenis in the voices of Natasha Theodoridou & Sarbel).

- Take me to the sea, please, my dear. I need to be where I feel as good as in your arms – a cosy and welcoming sense of being home... I really need this...

He drove me to our favourite beach, where we used to go when we needed to recharge our batteries. That was a choice he made, stating it was his preferred spot, where he used to go in search of peace and silence. And then that turned out to be our secret hiding place, away from everyone and everything. The beach was secluded and deserted when we reached it, quite late in the morning. The day was pretty warm, in spite of being still wintertime.

As soon as we reached the shoreline, I took my walking shoes off. The sand was incredibly sallow, soft, fine and almost warm when we strode along the water’s edge. The sea water itself was appealing and amazingly blue.

Accepting Nature’s quiet invitation, I let myself go from his side and walked into the ocean. The sensation was of a somewhat tepid tongue licking my toes and the thought made me smirk. He looked at me with his impressively inquisitive hazel eyes and smiled slightly.

He knew me already too well to know that I had thought of naughty things. He came closer and played with the water around my feet, touching me as if it was occasionally but we both knew that was a kind of non-verbal code to have me hugged.

I pretended not to notice his intentions and walked into the sea a little further on. He pulled me back, holding my arm and setting his feet firmly in the sand. My body lost balance and hit his while his arms surrounded me, firm and solid, like a Greek Ionic column standing proudly in one of the front sides of the temple.

His well-built, lean body turned out to be both a divine and a profane shrine for me... not only for the beauty and sturdy simplicity and perfection, but also for the vigour and welcoming feeling of being sheltered in his balmy embrace, allied to the lusty fountain of delight he provided me with.

In my mind, a strange sense of obsession switched a red light on. Should I be afraid or should I let myself be addicted to his presence and his welcoming bliss?

We were nothing but two lonely souls floating in love and in life like two cruising ships sailing adrift and looking for a safe port to dock. Standing there with my feet in the sea waters, feeling held by the arms of that gentle and sweet, although strong man, I felt like my ship was finally coming to a safe harbour.

He turned my body around to look me in the eyes, the way he used to and enjoyed doing and said:

- We are like the sea, aren’t we?

An old song came immediately to mind and I said, almost singing:

- “...But your heart is like the ocean, mysterious and dark”... (Bob Dylan: ‘One more cup of coffee’).

He chuckled and corrected me, trying not to waste the moment or miss the rhyme:

- Our hearts are like the ocean, mysterious and warm.

I smiled and nodded. He was correct. We were definitely like the sea – mystifying, deep, sometimes gloomy and yet so extraordinarily warm. And although we had so much in common there was still so much yet uncovered in our lives.

Buried pasts, forgotten secrets, options made in lieu of the anguish suffered and choices made so not to repeat mistakes - all of those were parts of us and of our past experiences and we had decided to let them go to the bottom of the deep blue sea of our souls, never to be recollected again. Our own private past histories were unimportant for the moment we were living together then.

Immense white sails had been unfurled then, greeting with warm welcome the powerful winds of oblivion and opening new routes and horizons, flowing freely from our minds, paying their dues to our private and secret pasts. It was time for new lands to be discovered, new voyages to be taken and new domains to be embraced...

- I’m gonna miss you, my dear... so very much...

His arms were strongly tied around me. I buried my face in his chest and said nothing. He just held me tighter...

***

Standing barefoot on the waterfront pier, looking at the distant line where the blue sky and the sea merge into each other, beyond the point of possible sight, I felt my body being suddenly surrounded by a gentle wind and I could not avoid but think of his powerful embrace. My sight became suddenly blurred.

I closed my eyes trying to hold the tears I felt flooding up off them, but they were faster to come out than I was to hold them in.

My spirit was already falling into a chasm of loneliness and nostalgia... More than one year had gone by since I had to depart away from him and from the land that made me find myself in the arms of the man who opened my life to his gentle kindness and loving care. So much had already passed and there was still so much to live and experience. I was yielding to the winds of change, but they were not giving me any comfort at all.

In an almost automatic gesture, I put the music to play on in the little mp3 player attached to my jeans beltless waistband and was not really surprised to hear the sound of a familiar Greek female voice singing those odd pronounced words - words that for a strange reason meant so much to me. A warm breeze surrounded my body as if welcoming my sorrow with kind tenderness and inviting me to fly... with it.

For a moment I had the impression I heard his voice whispering in my ears:

- “We are so very much like the sea, aren’t we?”

Inside my mind I felt my soul was blaring out loud my loneliness without sending a single sound out of my mouth. Those warm and quiet tears of bittersweet nostalgic melancholy fell freely down my face, dripped off my chin and ended up intermingling with the cold sea waters playing quietly underneath my bare feet.

I looked down at the tide repeatedly and relentlessly washing the sand underneath the dark wood logs where I was standing on and took a deep breath. I was entirely worn out and did not need to play the strongest ring of the chain to anyone else. I could not hold it any longer so I let myself cry... openly and in profound distress...

The Universe likes playing with my heart - or so it seemed - when another song started coming from the earplugs in my ears, inside my head and teasing my mind, as if mocking my already frayed emotions...

“σαν δυο σταγόνες νερού, κομμάτια εμείς τ' ουρανού

πεσμένα πάνω στη γη,

για πάντα μαζί, για πάντα μαζί...”

(San dyo stagónes neroú, kommátia emeís t' ouranoú

pesména páno sti gi,

gia pánta mazí, gia pánta mazí…)


(Like two water drops, we are pieces of sky
 
Fallen on earth,

Forever together, forever together…)

*Giorgos Mazonakis * San dyo stagones vroxis* (Music and lyrics: Phoebus)

My body shuddered as I slowly sat down, still weeping. I felt like I was, for some incomprehensible reason, tenderly caressing my own pain. My pale toes were slightly touched by the fresh and smooth tidal waves so close down under the quay. The sensation was unexpectedly comforting and really soul-soothing.

My so dearly and cherished grief had definitely become one with the sea. Those teardrops were undeniably crucial to wash my soul clean and away. They slowly diluted in the immense vastness of the great and immeasurable ocean, fading into the waters as soon as they trickled down from my eyes.

The invisible arms of the wind embracing my body and probably my soul and the refreshing tickle of the sea, leisurely fondling my feet, made me feel somewhat comfortable, just by being there, by the ocean, completely forgotten by the problems of existence. I realized I had unquestionably done my best, given my best and received the finest...

I have lived a life with a lot to be proud of and not so much to complain about. My past experiences had prepared my heart to fully live the present with conscious satisfaction and gratitude.

It was time to welcome a fresh zest for new days to open right ahead in time...

The sensation of having my body being wrapped up by somewhat powerful wings, made me close my eyes and allow myself being taken... completely... by a challenging and fearless fruition.

I was ready for the future after all... thanks to my past... unquestionably!!!