Ari And Laura Go To The Beach

Going to the beach is a real hassle these days. Not only do we have awful traffic and weather that could rival an African desert, there's also me. A fainter. Now, I'm pleased to report that I haven't fainted since I knocked out at that convenience store concert in Portland last year. That makes me faint-free since '14.
To maintain this stellar record I have avoided the beach, downtown Charleston, and hot work of any fashion.

Ari also has had minimal beach time since she moved to New Orleans all those years ago. She's been dying for a beach day. "But I'm a fainter Ari! I can't!" I told her.
"But you can bring a hat and sunglasses." she said. "Oh oh! I'll bring a beach umbrella!"

A beach umbrella. A contraption I have no adult recollection of ever sitting under. "How would that help?" I wondered. It's heat that gets me, not sunlight. So we made a plan for our Tuesday afternoon.
We ate lunch at our favorite Mexican food restaurant, I picked up gummy watermelons, Ari loaded her car with beach gear, and off we went. Boy was it hot. We trekked onto the sunny beach and found a good spot to plop down. We unfolded beach chairs and Ari stabbed a contraption she calls 'ExCaliber' into the sand. She pushed and grunted. She leaned her entire body weight onto ExCaliber's handle and then she stabbed an umbrella pole into the hole that ExCaliber created. I watched, observing the process of preparing a beach umbrella. She worked diligently. "Almost." she told me as I stood in the blazing sun, counting the moments to lightheadedness. And then that beauty opened a rainbow umbrella and we shuffled our chairs underneath it, turning them away from the sun, pointing down the beach rather than facing the water.

It was lovely under the beach umbrella, shady with a breeze. We happily prepared two celebratory margarita's as a toast to our first successful beach day. We sat cheerfully, people watching and determining whether our rainbow umbrella was flagging us as a gay couple.

About fifteen minutes into our perfect beach day, Ari noticed a suspicious patch in the sky. "That looks like a little rain shower" she said pleasantly. No matter, we'd ride it out but then we noticed people on the beach gawking and pointing at the sky behind us. Our eyes met, and we slowly turned our heads to look behind us.
"Oh no!" we shouted.

And so we quickly shimmied back into our clothes, tossed our crap into my big navy bag, and set to work folding up the chairs and unearthing ExCaliber. People everywhere were packing and scattering and the wind was picking up. A lone red beach chair blew past us like a tumbleweed. I noticed one girl taking a selfie in front of the storm.

Within six minutes we were back in Ari's green Subaru, our windswept hair loaded with sand. It still wasn't raining so we sat for a while mulling over other options before determining that we should probably just go home. It started to sprinkle as we went around the traffic trying to leave the beach and then suddenly the rain was torrential. The radio alerted us to wind gusts up to 60mph and potential roof damage. We plowed through the rain, barely able to make out the cars in front of us. It was kind of exciting though we were disappointed as a whole and also sad that we never got a chance to eat the gummy watermelons.

"Maybe next summer." I said, as we silently watched the storm outside.

Someday Ari and Laura will get to have a beach day.