a brief catalogue of my favorite summer waters

and once again, I am drinking the sun

Hi friends,

I’ve been reflecting on the whiplash nature of this summer and the pockets of time that held me down the most. Unsurprisingly, the moments I felt the happiest and most grounded were the times I spent alongside bodies of water. I used to only worship the ocean; these days, I’m waterway agnostic. Ponds, rivers, lakes, pools, bays — I’ll take them all. This season, I only visited a handful, but I was able to spend signifigant time at each of them, learning their language.

I wrote them down — maybe you’ll take a look and tell me what yours were, too?

Early this year, I was thrilled to spend a month in Durham for a film fellowship. It was already summer there, with temperatures in the high 80s, and the acupuncturist I was working with there told me to visit the Eno River on a full moon. Tbh, I’ve never really been a river person — something about the frigid temperatures, slippery rocks and the current — but my time by this channel shifted something inside of me. I brought along a jar of honey for an offering, and I’m so glad I did. It is a spiritual place, and thrummed with so much aliveness that I understoond why people advocate for rivers to have legal personhood, included the right to be free from pollution and to sue violators (!).

My beloved Riis Beach in Queens, NY. Less of a staple in my summer routines these days, but I spent more time out there this year while working on the short film I started in Durham, which is about the queer histories and ecologies that make the place. To kick off the official season, I joined the Riis Bloc Association crew to install the blue accessibility mat and it was a raucous, festive time. Even though it was May, people were already sunbathing with their buns out. We celebrated Queen Victoria, saw the banjo guy, had a run-in with NPS — that place will never not feel like one of my homes.

A few years ago, I realized that I could only stay in New York City if I changed my proximity to nature. Living closer to Prospect Park felt like the best approximation for my physical need to regularly lay my eyes on light and water. Organizing my life around bird watching in the mornings and the sunsets at night has extended my warranty in the city by a few more years, at least.

In July, I traveled to Sicily to celebrate my good friend Collier’s 40th birthday. I arrived feeling a little bodysick and heartsick. I found the Italian island to be an incredibly potent island, full of eroticism and mysticism, and loved my time there so much I’ve been talking to a local real estate agent about making it official. The trip started with a gorgeous party on a farm in the middle of the country, and wound its way towards the north-western coast. (I’ll always hold a soft spot in my heart for the boat trip from Palermo and our captain Davide!) I ended my stay at a small village called Scopello which had some of the most sweetest water I’ve ever swum in. Crystal-clear, turquoise blue waters, sun-warmed, low salinity. I experience all water as a homecoming, but there was something about the Mediterranean on this trip that was particularly healing.

One day, while walking around Scopello, I met a ceramicist and knitter named Giovanna, who has a small shop in town where she sells her handmade ceramics and sexy crochet bikinis. She told me about Terme Segestane, the hydrothermal springs just a bit outside of town, in Castellammare del Golfo, and insisted I go one evening, if for no other reason than that local lore has it that Hercules frequented the baths and found refreshment there. I brought it to the group I was traveling with — everyone wanted to go. We drove there one afternoon to soak in the sulphurous waters, which could be experienced bubbling from the ground, or in a more formal outdoor bath facility. My favorite part were all the older Italian men puffing on cigarettes next to the “no smoking” signs.

In late August, my dear friend Cat invited me to celebrate her 60th birthday in Martha’s Vineyard. We both love a morning dip, so we slipped away from the group and drove out to Philbin Beach, near where we were staying. It was the most refreshing plunge, both in temperature and in visual beauty. It was low tide, which revealed a really long and beautiful expanse of sea-soaked sand each time a wave trailed out, and the intertidal zone reflected the clouds in the sky. Stunning. While basking in the divinity of that view, I noticed some weird, faint white structures dotting the horizon. Later, Cat’s good friend Juli Vanderhoop, a Wampanoag island elder (who owns the fantastic Orange Peel Bakery in Aquinnah and makes her own honey and killerrrr gluten-free brownies) told me that they were part of an off-shore windfarm that the tribe was fighting. The Wampanoag are native to southern New England, and their name translates to "People of the First Light.” Juli shared that the obstruction to the horizon felt like a blow to the body, an interference with the connection between the people and Creator. At night, it’s even worse. They are illuminated with an eerie red glow, interrupting the glory of the sunset. Devastating.

On our last night in the Vineyard, we had an easy meal of baked salmon, watermelon/sungold tomato/corn salad and greens, and over dinner, we talked about our current obsessions. (Mine included cyanotyping, which I can’t get enough of, and Juli’s biscuits.) But it also came up that we’re all obsessed with figuring out how to sustain each other during this time, and care about each others griefs and lives and needs.

I’m grateful for yet another season of living and learning how to do that.