Today I floated on a pool and bathed in sunshine. This has not been a warm, sunny summer – just yesterday rain was pouring miserably while I was at work. But today the sun was out, and I took advantage.

I love the sun. I have to wear a ridiculously high SPF sunscreen to keep myself non-lobster-esque, so in the height of summer I tend to avoid the direct sunlight, but oh does it feel glorious after all the rain and overcast gloominess. I needed it. My skin and soul soaked it up, warmth I need to keep myself whole.

I love the water, too, which is why I prefer to sunbathe while floating, parts of my skin still submerged in the water. The feeling of my fingers drifting through the cool water, the gentle rise and fall as I ride the ripples sent out from the movements of others, it just brings me back to my home. I practically grew up in a boat – my dad bought our first one shortly after I was born. We stored all the life vests in the bow, tucked underneath against the fiberglass sides of the hull. I would always crawl in there as a child, curl up on my little nest of life vests, listening to the sound of water swooshing against the sides of the boat. My mom would look at me a little green, asking how on earth I could handle being totally enclosed like that, unable to see. But it was my version of a rocking chair. No matter what boat we were in – the canoe, the aluminum car-topper, or later the bayliner ski boat, I was always found curling up in the bow, my safe place.

Today BabyH splashed and swam with SIL in one end of the pool. The sun warmed my face as the water cooled my hands and feet. I closed my eyes, breathed deep, and for a little while nothing at all really mattered.