Sunday, January 17, 2010

The Summer Of Love...


I have been lucky enough to have relocated for three weeks to climes other than the usual, to a place I call "Paradise".  No, I didn't get my grubby little hands on a stash of high-dose LSD, an heroic quantity of psilocybin mushrooms, or the latest batch of pharmaceutical-grade DMT (God!  As if!).  Instead, I packed the family into the car and drove for a thousand kilometres - itself a mind-altering experience - to reach the (Australian) equivalent of Nirvana.

Now rather than just give you a blow-by-blow of the whole twenty-odd days, let me just give you a short list of my favourite experiences...

(In no particular order...)
  • Salty, sea- and sunscreen-flavoured kisses
  • The squeal and laughter of my children as they run full-pelt into the water at the beach
  • Playing golf - my first time, and I'm nearly ashamed to say that I am a convert
  • Oysters and prawns and fish all with lemon juice and tobasco, and always with either a very cold, dry beer or very cold sauvignon blanc
  • Smoking a joint and listening to the surf on the balcony after the kids are in bed
  • A blue moon on a warm clear night, the light reflecting off the ocean, so beautiful it seems almost corny
  • Swimming in the surf, that sweet sensation of being lulled into a state of pure relaxation by the rhythm of the ocean
  • The feel of sand on skin, and in hair, after a morning of being at the beach
  • Having a manta ray swim past me, and then spending the next 20 minutes watching for shadows in the water
  • The feel of the first sunburn 
  • Reading a book in the sun for the whole day
  • The modern day prep of 20 minutes of sunscreen application - a relaxing and meditative routine itself
Another thing that I noticed that was very significant was the effect the Ocean had on my libido.  Goddammit if I wasn't horny just about all the time!  I'm not talking about walking around with a constant hard-on, rather, just the feeling of being turned-on, a kind of constant, low-level background zinging. I had no need to wonder if this seemingly Reichian effect is actual or imaginary because my partner seemed to be affected in the same way!  Did Dr Reich ever study the Ocean in this way?  Was there ever a study done to measure the Orgone of the Ocean?  Let me know.