Standing barefoot at the edge where the soil is thin, I feel them moving beneath me, roots inching towards the sea. They are traveling to break free of the land. Crawling through the dark, branching and stretching, connecting and breaking, they wait to see the light, hear the sea, smell the salt air, and feel the wind of stories they have heard.
I hear one call back to the others: It’s all true. The stories are real. I see the light of day. And then the wind begins its work, stripping them of the world they have known. They swing free, nothing beneath them but the sea. They are both terrified and exhilarated, inhaling fresh air and yearning for soil, embracing warm daylight and longing for the coolness of the dark. Back and forth, they swing higher and higher until they let go, extend their arms, and fly.
They tumble down the sandy cliff, somersaulting branches over roots. The world spins too fast to stop; they lose control. Gravity has them now. They cannot go back, cannot unknow what they have learned. Never more alive, they have never felt such danger. Then, dizzy with freedom, they land on the beach, where they must wait for the rising tide.
Early on, the tide does not come for them. They wonder if they have made a mistake, misunderstood the signs, fallen victim to foolish dreaming. But then the moon grows full, and an offshore storm pushes waves that reach the cliffs. Swallowed by the undertow, the waves strip them of their bark, and the salt sinks deep, hardening them to bone as everything but their core is stripped away. They float without care, with nothing to hold them back. They rise and fall with the tide, enjoying the view as the current carries them away.
Reduced by the elements to their beginnings, they ride the crests of the high tide and anchor themselves on the beach, laying claim to their new space. The waters recede, and they remain standing — driftwood statues.
They have returned home to the place they worked so hard to leave. Filled with the wisdom of all they have seen, honed by all they have endured, and twisted into the shape they were born to express, they offer their contribution. They have become different than they were and the same as they have always been, stripped of what they were not; they no longer pretend.
The edge is not the end; it is where the world folds back under itself, so we might understand that you cannot be anyone other than who you are — letting go is how everything begins.
Letting Go