Waving Goodbye

As a university professor of psychology, I know that many fears that we have are creatures of a negative imagination that we cannot shake. They are mental creatures you do not like to tell others. It takes a lot of nerve for me to present this story to you as an example of my own irrational fear of being drowned by incoming waves of high tide on a beach that faces the ocean. But I want to let you know that no matter how intelligent you are, you can still be influenced, even ruled by the irrational.

The history of my great fear goes back to when I was a child of five. It was the first time that I had ever been to a beach. It was a family get together on the northern shores of Prince Edward Island, the province in which my mother had grown up. I did not know at that time, that she had witnessed a drowning in high waves when she was a child, something she never told me until I had become an adult. I could say that I inherited her fear on that day on the beach. She stayed close to me whenever I got anywhere near the water, and would grab me by my right arm whenever I approached the sea water, and shouted “You could drown if you go into the waves.” Her words and her actions dug deep into my soul, and would not leave.

When I was a student at university, there was a young woman that I was very interested in. We very much enjoyed our first two dates, but our third and last date was a total disaster. She owned a car, but I did not. After dinner she told me to prepare for a surprise. She drove us to the beach, and when we arrived there she tossed me a bathing suit, and she quickly changed into her own. There was no one else there as it was quite dark. She ran to the water, and I walked slowly to the same destination. It was my very bad luck that the tide was rising and there were some very big waves coming in and crashing onto the beach. She ran into the water, and waved at me to join her, but I could not. After a few steps towards the water, I pictured my drowning, a picture I could not dismiss. I could read the disappointment followed by anger on her face when I told her that I couldn’t swim into a high tide. She shouted to me that she had not realized that I was such a suck. We never went out again, and she would glare at me when we passed each other in the university halls, and she would mouth the word ‘suck’ when she looked at me.

It was a while before I went out with another woman. When she suggested that we go swimming at the beach, I very much did not want her to dump me, so I told her that I was allergic to seawater. I did not want her to know about my fears. She was very accepting of what I said, even though she had a look of mild disbelief. She valued our relationship as much as I did, so she did not mention the beach again.

Still, as I became a graduate student in psychology, and the relationship continued and grew, I vowed that I was going to fight my fear, but do so without a witness who might judge me. 

I went during the afternoon, when there was a high tide. I put on my bathing suit, and walked tentatively to the water. I got as far as taking a few steps into the shallow water when an image of me drowning overwhelmed my emotions. I had to step back. I did not seem able to overcome my fear. I wondered whether I should share my problem with my favourite professor, but I wanted his respect too much to show this kind of weakness. He had talked to me of my being his research assistant once I received my Master’s degree. I did not want to jeopardize my career in this way. I got the position, which eventually led to my being hired as a professor

           Life was treating us well. My wife, Martha, gave birth to a son, whom we called Jim, who charmed the two of us easily. When he was five years old and in kindergarten, he asked us if we could go to the beach. His schoolmates talked about how much fun it was. “Why don’t we go to the beach, mom, dad? Everyone says you can have a lot of fun there.”

           I did not want to say no to him on this matter, so I thought that I might be able to divert his activity there. “Jim, we can make sand castles on the beach. Does that sound like fun to you?” He gave me a great big smile, so I thought we could have a good time, without invoking my fears. I showed him some videos of sand castles being built, and he was clearly charmed by what we would be doing at the beach.

           I took him to the hardware store, and bought three very small shovels ideally built for the construction of sand castles. One of those shovels would go to him, one for Martha and one for myself. It would be an ideal family activity.

On Saturday we went down to the beach, and picked out what looked like an ideal spot for sand castle building, not that any of us could have really known what that was. I was happy to situate this spot far enough to not have to worry about the rising tide. The three of us dug and built, dug and built. Martha suggested that we look for a couple of stones to crown our creation. Thinking of nothing else, I immediately headed towards the reeds where I had earlier seen a couple of stones that would be ideal for our purposes.

Once I got there, I picked up several stones. Then I turned around and saw Jim sprinting towards the waves. As Martha would inform me later, Jim had spotted likely-looking stones when the tide was not covering them. Now they were in water at least as deep to reach beyond his knees. He ran right into the water, and soon fell, not expecting nor knowing about the power of the waves. I could hear him cry out with the words “mom, dad.”

My parental instincts turned on immediately, and I ran into the water, not invoking my nearly life-long fears. I nearly tripped, but was able to maintain my balance, pick Jim up and carry him, walking boldly through the waves without thinking that they were a threat to me.     

And that, dear students, is how I overcame that fear that I told you about. A lesser fear was overruled by a greater one. I am thinking of writing about it.