Monday, July 18, 2016
Ibiza, Spain
Beach #2: The Tropicana. We went with Lola and met her cousin Juliano, who looks like a blue-eyed Javier Bardem. Gruff, but pleasant and kind in that way that Italians are (they know a guy!) At the end of the day, they just want to look after you and make sure you’re having a good time. This is why I love Italians.
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Beach #4: Sunset Ashram, Cala Comte. I needed to pick up a blanket for Erin and Carolyn. I sort of assumed we would swim at the beach right there, the one Joao and I slipped into in the middle of the night last year while cocaine-fueled, middle-aged Germans danced to electronic music above. But Raica took us on a short walk to another beach that sat down in a cove — private, more intimate. There were a bunch of naked people. It was perfect.
The beach itself was a little rocky, but once you got in the water? Only sand. Finally!
We swam and watched the sunset. It’s totally cliche to call it breathtaking, right? But that is the simple reality. Watching the uppermost tip of the sun sink below the horizon has this way of taking everything out of you in a single whoosh. And when you recover, and the sky quickly changes color, you feel this connectedness to the earth and for a (very) brief moment you turn into a total goddamn hippie. I haven’t felt that way too many times, but this island (and Cala Comte in particular) seems to bring it out.
It’s ethereal; it’s mystical; it’s calming.
I close my eyes and blue spirals fly everywhere. That is, of course, a terrible explanation. But it’s all I’ve got…
Why always blue?
A deep, dark blue.
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Later that evening we hung out on the balcony. Conversation that was simultaneously breezy and deep. We shared memories from the year before. This is a group with whom I have memories! They’re special, these people.
And slowly the group of five dwindled down to a group of two: me and Joao. We were still on New York time. 4 a.m. — completely relaxed, completely not sleepy.
We played music for each other while the trees rustled around us, trying to decide on a wedding song. Tom Waits, maybe? Radiohead?
Let’s see in two years.
slackerology 