This is a swim shirt. It's what I wear at the beach to avoid exposure; exposure to too much sun and exposure of everyone else to too much Bill.
This is also a replacement swim shirt. You see, yesterday while boogie boarding with Luke, I decided to take the shirt off for a few moments; just long enough to catch some rays and a couple of waves. The waves were decent enough for a couple of guys to surf just a hundred yards north of us, and I was riding them about a 150 feet in each time. Lots of fun, especially with "cool dude" Luke riding beside me (he looks back and gives me a thumbs up every time he catches a wave.)
Anyway, I had taken the shirt off and stowed it in a pocket of my swimsuit that has a Velcro flap top. After one particularly turbulent boogie, guess what was no longer in my pocket. I scanned the beach and the water for some time, but it was gone. Gone, gone, gone.
So I had to go buy this replacement one. And while I wasn't happy about the $30 cost of my stupidity, honestly the thing that bothered me most was the fact that I had just littered in the ocean. It bothered me enough that I spent our dusk beach walk picking up trash on the beach as a kind of penance.
Which brings me to James Bond. I enjoy the Daniel Craig James Bond. Of course, he's a badass and gets the women, but the part of that character that I envy most is his disposable nature. Everything is disposable. When he's done with something he drops it. Literally. Clothes, cars, guns...even women. Monetary value isn't really a consideration. When something is no longer of immediate use, it's left behind.
I constantly struggle with things' "usefulness." I avoid throwing things away because they might be of future use and end up collecting a lot of crap along the way. It's how my basement ends up full of half broken stuff, like an Island of Misfit Toys, just waiting to be fixed or repurposed. James Bond would drop it all; maybe the house too.
Not a realistic way to live, but a fun one to daydream about. So, until I magically develop a six pack, an English accent, and an entire branch of a secret organization designed to supply me with disposable stuff, I'll keep scanning the tide for my shirt.
Post script: I wrote this while sitting on the balcony watching the sun come up. Literally as I hit the post button, a young boy and his mother walked back up from the beach with a towel wrapped around the boy's waist, and the mother carrying his swimsuit in her hand. Does this ocean have it out for swim apparel?
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