Prompt: What’s Happening Now

Writing Challenge Day 11 of 30

She stares out into the vastness. It’s hard to tell where the ocean ends and where the sky begins. In all of her 63 years, this is the first time Maureen has seen the ocean in person. It’s different from what she imagined. The waves are louder. The air smells more unpleasant, like shellfish. And, the water feels grimier.

She lays herself down on the sand, trying to absorb the feeling of the ocean. If she had spent her childhood with these sensations, then she supposes these are not feelings that are easily replicable and can understand her friend’s nostalgia. To her now, the ocean makes her feel small. It’s the same feeling she has when looking out into a star-filled sky.

A few feet away, her granddaughter, Lily, is admiring seashells. Lily yells, “Grandma, will you build a sand castle with me?”

Maureen nods. Better now than never to get the whole ocean experience.

(A grandmother arrives at the ocean for the very first time in her life)