Checkpoint Hill
The surfers stand on top of the resting bench, craning their necks to look above the lantana and natural sand dune scrub to see what the waves were doing on this crisp, winter morning. I didn’t have to know them to know they had names like Ringo, Didgie, Jungle, Bull, or Weedie. I didn’t have to hear their conversation to know that as they pointed their fingers, they were asking each other how big they thought the sets were, or talking about how sweet the right break was, or how they better get out there soon as the waves were starting to close out.
I sit with Kalyra and Craig, and our flat whites in miniature coffee cups, longing for an American sized mug like surfers
Coffee and cake
long for the Green Room. The Surf Club cafe is new; tables and chairs sit out on the grass with scant views of the ocean through pockets of lantana scrub.
“I don’t want the muffin. I want to see the beach mummy.” Kalyra begs me with the pull on my sweater to take her down the access track to see the beach of Mummy’s childhood. My calves burn slightly as one foot buries down into the sand while I dig the other out; the trudging made more difficult by carrying her now heavy 3-year-old body. A line of surfers walk past carrying their boards, with what looks like a surf instructor leading them in and evaluating their performance. I inwardly chuckle at the thought of a surf school at Umina Beach.
“So many people, Mummy”
“Well honey, that is because the surf is up. That doesn’t happen much down at this beach. And when the surf is up the town comes down to savour the swell. These surfers will even take days off work or school, just for the chance of a right break, even if it is only 3 feet tall.”
Umina Beach
“It’s so beautiful Mummy,” she jumps down to dig for treasure in the sand. She uncovers it and tosses it to be carried away by the gentle breeze. The golden sand is cold as I sift it through my fingers. While she plays, I sit and stare mesmerized by the pull of the ocean. Sets roll in and the white walls of water crash down one after the other. I’m happy to know that the only sound I need to be heard over is the roar of the ocean, not that I really want to talk. I let the beach take center stage and relax into this moment.
The surfers swing their boards from side to side as they ride a clean break, sweet even for Umina standards. My eyes follow a dog as it bounds around the sweeping curve of the beach to the rocky point; my favorite place to run. I would jog over the rocks to the point, scramble up the top of the small cliff to the bush track above. Just me, the bush, the smells and sounds of nature, and the ocean. On my return, I’d cool off with a swim in the calmest part of the beach, the corner where the beach ends and the rocks begin. The water like glass, holding my back up as I take in the serenity of the view out to stately lions island sitting guard at the entrance of the mouth of the Hawkesbury River as she flows into the Pacific.
“I could never be a surfer. It’s too damn cold,” Craig shivers as he watches a scantily clad surfer making his way back onshore.
“Me neither. And then there’s the sharks. They sure are dedicated to their passion. Anything for a wave.”
We walk back up to our bikes and as I start my cycle past the surfers checkpoint hill, a sweet fragrance fills my nose and instantly transports me back to my teenage years. My mind grasps to rediscover the smell. Sunblock? No, it’s too sweet for that, but a beach smell nevertheless, so the confusion is warranted. It’s the smell that used to greet me every day in summer, as I walked giggling past the cute surfer boys down the beach path to bake with my girlfriends and attempt to surf. And I’m sure that was when the boys would laugh back. I look up and see clumps of sweet-scented wattle trees amongst the native scrub of the sand dunes. I scan the sand dune area of the beach up and down and notice the small golden flowers everywhere.
The wattle glows in the sand dunes
The wattle, our country’s native floral emblem; a flower I only recently spoke of to my students back in America, and struggled to remember where I had seen them in the wild. Here I was as a teenager walking by them almost daily, without even recognizing their pale golden color that blazed through the beach. I’m shocked and I stop for a moment to absorb this. I look to the left, and banksias, their bright orange color faded by the cold of winter, jump out from behind the leaves of the tree. When did they get here? A whole new world of color and life opens up to me just by me opening up to it. This is living in the present. What thought world was I trapped in for all those years? Where did that thought world take me? Did it change the problems of my past or did it help to create my future? Not at all. My thought world stole the pleasures of the sensory world from me- the only way for me to experience life.
I feel the ocean pulling me back and I don’t want to leave. This was always my place of peace. I would come and sit on my own, watch the surfers, listen to the sound of the ocean, sift the sand through my fingers, and feel that if life was forever lived in this moment, it would be perfect.
And it is.
