It had been a long time since I’d been to water. <\/span><\/p>\n Two years or more, probably.<\/span><\/p>\n Stepping out of the car at the Port Stanley beach, I was hit by the smell of deep friers and sunscreen. Beachgoers played volleyball or tried to bronze themselves for the perfection that the cities they lived-in demanded, and children, like radiant beasts, played– their happiness a wildfire burning along the surf. Overhead the gulls flew, their shadows rippling along the sand, a kind of double life, <\/span><\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n and then, looking forward, there was Lake Erie stretching out as far as you could see until it became sky. <\/span><\/p>\n Like the pilgrim I was, I walked down to the water. Standing up to my knees, an oxygen tank slung over my shoulder, I closed my eyes and held out my arms, waiting for something to wash through me and lift all the scars, bruises and fears of the last couple of years free from my body. <\/span><\/p>\n It seemed like a perfunctory, symbolic act rather than a felt one though, and I trudged back to our towels feeling a little disappointed. As I looked around I noticed a blind woman sitting nearby. Pale, thin and out of fashion, she looked like she had been confined to an indoor life of illness and uncertainty, and that this, this outing was a step outside of the protected, comfort zone she typically inhabited. But she did not look happy. She sat in a rigid, defensive posture, her face turned away from things, her fingers worrying some rosary beads she kept clutched in her hands. <\/span><\/p>\n