Big and hairy Turkish and Russian men – apart from the lifeguards, there are hardly any women here – are waiting for the approaching waves with childlike excitement. The waves, after they have passed over me, make me, too, laugh or at least smile in a way that is far more immediate and spontaneous than my response to a joke or my reaction to something smart, strange, or interesting.
The sea is not interesting. The pleasure that I get from swimming is sexual.
When I try to jump over the crest of an approaching wave or swim across it, I treat the sea as a woman. In case I fail, the sea splashes water in my face like during an orgasm, which always has an element of unexpectedness in it – why else is the first postcoital reaction usually a laugh or a smile?
The pleasure is much greater when I swim in the same direction with the wave until it cancels my effort, takes me over for a second, and carries me on for metres.
In that case, I let the sea be the man.
August 2014