![]() ![]() As it was June, it was nice and warm so I went there one evening after a trail run.Īs soon as I sank into the water I regretted it. I’d walked the dog a few times at a place nearby with photogenic kettle holes full of water. However, near the end of the month I was running thin on local options to where I live, in Inverness. Seeing as how the days are so long in the Highlands over summer, I was sure this would be no problem at all. And even as I screamed above the noise of shrieking gulls and stormy summer, I knew I would stray again, and soon.Ī couple of years set myself the plan to swim every day in June, and always somewhere different, to make a short film. I could never share what you did to me back there, that has to be our secret, but I held my earthling tight whispering, let’s be landlubbers, safe, together, forever. I took The Earthling in my arms and pulled him away from you, as far as I could, out of danger. I scrabbled up, my legs giving way and screamed, get out, get out. Shrouded now in fog and spray there he was sitting on the beach, drenched by your pounding angry heartbeat dumping sand, seaweed, plastic bottles, blue glass, dead crabs and finally me, his watery wife, back on the shingle. Eventually, The Earthling coming into focus, I dared to stop propelling forward and let my legs drop reaching down – my toes clawing for sand, or rock, even a flatfish beneath your shallowing depths. ![]() You remembered to give me a teasing maul often enough, then ignored me again, until I could take my chance and reach out for another length. And my cool poker face saved me, inch by inch you lost interest and released me back towards the land. I knew you could win, and I knew you would win if I showed alarm. Is this what happens after happy ever after? I would deserve it, adulterous me. Not today, after yesterday, the wedding, when I had felt so held aloft by human love. I had to use every inch of my energy and every micro muscle to get back to him, to land. I retreated, hurt, embarrassed, vulnerable, ashamed, acknowledging defeat, back towards The Earthling on the beach and that’s when you kicked me, right when I was down. I would be out beyond the bay, moving out of foreshore play into the serious stuff. Some few hundred feet into your bulging troughs, I turned back to look at The Earthling on the strand but he was too far away for me to see him wave without my prescription goggles so I turned from him back toward you, gravity an unimportant memory, into your embrace, only ten more yards and I would be swimming beneath your arch’s span. And silly me, I thought we were having fun playing our water-field. You matched my every move, slipping round my deft presses, pushes, slices, strokes, caresses. I plunged into lumpy grey waters, alone, leaving The Earthling, not a swimmer, in the shallows oblivious to my overconfident plunge back to you, his rival. I had longed to swim through your arch for years. A squally August day, when the sea fret descended at Durdle Door. I trusted you and you replied ‘trust is for sissies’. ![]() Your benign self has become part of me, each encounter buoyed up my better self – but it’s the times you betrayed me that I can’t get over. No, I can’t remember those times half so well. I can’t recall the myriad gentle brooks and burns, the tranquil blues, the lapping azure when we were getting on famously. The times you challenged my will, when you fought me, exhausted me, bruised me and made me bleed. Why is it when I think of my relationship with you I only remember the bad times? The wicked, risky, nearly-got-caught times. Joanna Scanlan, actress, on a treacherous honeymoon swim ![]()
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