Remembering

It would have been Friends 54th birthday today. I would have let the day slide, it's not something we have ever done as a family, doing something on past ones birthdays. When Nellie of the Woods asked if I wanted to do something my knee jerk reaction was no - she is always with me and I don't need a special day to remember her on. However I then thought it would in fact be a nice thing to do - not her place of burial but somewhere we had been together where I had happy memories of who she was before the cancer was even suspected. On her 50th we had gone to Polkerris - a small Cornish harbour. She loved to swim on her birthday. Myself, Vegan Jo and The Gardener had celebrated with her. So it was Nellie, Colourful Mai and Homeopathic Girl and me. They had both asked me if I planned to do something at the party on Sunday.
When we arrived we had a coffee outside the pub in the sunshine. We talked of Friend and suddenly we all got overwhelmed with emotion and choked up. Totally unexpected, totally overwhelming. I then got an email from The Daughters whom I had messaged to say what we were doing and that they were welcome to join us. They loved the fact we were doing something together and that it was a swim - they had been to Polkerris on her last birthday - this time they planned to go to Constantine bay where they had gone to with her many times.  The message said they were slow starting as all too emotional - so that made me cry. 
Once we had composed ourselves we headed onto the beach to swim. I have not swum in the sea since I moved down here! Always felt it was too cold and I would have a heart attack through shock, and have never been a beach person in the summer. I love swimming, used to go to the local pool every Saturday with my dad as a child, and on holidays would swim far out and then swim across looking back at the beach,  Like my dad could not get me out of the water!  I have always suffered from apnea if water splashes in my face, and when I was going through my funny miss-swallowing apnea period swimming was the last thing I wanted to do! So the only swimming I did was in the hydrotherapy pool with my pupils!  However for Friend I was determined to.  Well it took me a while to get fully immersed but once I was the love of swimming in the sea flooded back to me! I was chuffed to bits and felt exhilarated! The others were genuinely pleased for me as at one point I had begun to walk out! Nellie quietly said to me as we were getting dry that it was Friends gift to me - giving me back the love of swimming in the sea. A very lovely thought.
We sat on the beach for ages afterwards - Nellie sketched, I went picking though the sand for pieces of glass and pretty shells and then took photographs, Mai and Girl talked! We then felt hungry so headed back to the pub! We had a look round the Art gallery afterwards. There were paintings by a local artist, Gordon Hunt, from Fowey which we all really liked. He describes them as painting with light. I was delighted when I processed my photographs to find I had caught a little of the light he paints so well with. I then had an ice-cream and the others had tea! By this time the tide had come fully in and there were people jumping off the harbour wall! Polkerris is a small harbour and it's down a narrow one car road with only one carpark - once the carpark is full thats it! No more people can get on the beach! So it's busy but not overcrowded and there is the usual sunbathing, swimming, sandcastle making, beach walking and paddle boarding - no surf on the south coast for body boarding apparently! There is the usual plethora of plastic from bucket and spades to blow up swans! But it feels like the holidays of my childhood. 
It was a perfect day in every way - and Friend would have loved it. It was the perfect way to spend what would have been her birthday.