The Pacific. Where you call home. You spend every fog filled morning and every setting sun with the water brushing across your ankles. There are sand dollars and seashells scattered across the sand. The seashells are the ones you've seen a thousand times and are oh so familiar with. In front of you west winds breathe into your lungs, and from behind, there your city stands. It is magnificent. It is where your house stands, perhaps your apartment, let's face it, you can only afford an apartment in San Francisco. While you're staring out into nothing but blue, behind you is the city where your dreams have climbed 50 and a few flights of stairs to the tallest building. Behind you is the city where your dreams have swayed in tall buildings as the earth shakes beneath you reminding you that you're small. But right now you're just staring out into the blue ocean, the golden sky, the bitter sweet cold air that makes you wish you wore your hair down to protect your shivering neck. You feel warm inside because your memories are sweet. The salt water comes up through your feet and cleanses your soul. This is home, you say. This is the air that I breathe and the sea that I see.
And there it is. You're running. You're running as fast as you can towards the water, warm east winds rushing past you as your feet feel stone… sand… salt water. The waves are calm, consistent, repetitiously caressing your ankles, the water slowly expanding up your pant leg. The seashells are orange and ancient. Rough. Thick. Prehistoric. You pick one up and study it in the palm of your hand. It possesses the same seashell like qualities you've always known, but it is unfamiliar. You take a deep breath and the air feels new. It flows gently and makes your lungs tingle like you've had too much nicotine again. Behind you stands a city between your city. It has dreams, too, dreams that probably rattle and shake, but then also make it to the top. The sky is grey, the sun is setting. Behind you. The sun is setting behind you and as you look into the soft grey sky you realize that maybe you feel at home, but what does that mean about your own home? Shouldn't you want to go back and watch the sun set into blue abyss and not rise? Wave broken bubbles skitter past your feet as you pace along the shore, spelling your new name in the sand and watching as those same wave broken bubbles dissipate between the letters and wash every last bit of you away. This is not my home, you say. This is not my home, nor is anything between the Atlantic and the Pacific. Not even the Pacific is my home. This is just the air that I breathe and the sea that I see.