Alexis Levitin

The sea was choppy when he first went in, but on rounding the headland, James found himself in smooth crystal-clear water stretching far into the distance. It was early enough in the morning that no one else had yet come to the remote beach on Ikaria. He was alone in the water and he was happy that way. Without haste and without purpose, he kept on swimming.

The rocks along the headland were smooth and elegant, as if the ancient gods had been sculptors who took delight in the beauty of their work. The gentle surge washed against the seductive curves of the grey rocks, each gentle invasion adding a touch more to the endless finishing of the great work. Lions, an elephant, a graceful woman reclining at the edge of the sea, all utterly tranquil, as the blue green waters flooded in, then out, leaving the grain of the rocks glistening with moisture. It was creation at work, and it was lovely.

But at the same time, James realized that the artistic, shaping force of nature bringing such beauty out of the rocks, was gently and inexorably, through time, wearing away at the very beauty it was conjuring forth. The give and take of the soft surge mirrored the give and take of time itself. No matter how beautiful it all was, one could never escape the final reality, even for rocks, so much more permanent than we: The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away. Nothing could be done about that, so James kept swimming.

The temperature of the sea was perfect. It was cool enough that when he first dove in the tiny shock had given him that sense of freshness, of vitality, that he had always loved, ever since his earliest days dabbling in the icy waters along the Maine coast. But here in the Aegean, the initial sting quickly faded, and he found himself utterly at home in water that seemed to embrace him with a maternal warmth. Swimming in the sea, he felt, was, after all, a returning home. Even the salty tang felt like home, echoing the hidden taste pulsing unnoticed through his own veins. It felt good, and he kept swimming.

As he continued beyond the headland, a broad bay spread before him. Along its edge, the same smooth jumble of rocks lined the water. But beyond the shore soared jagged mountains of naked stone, rising almost perpendicular above the abiding sea. Those rough faces had not been softened by the sea’s persistence. They loomed above as they were born, gigantic, overwhelming, indifferent. They seemed the work of earlier gods not interested yet in beauty, satisfied with grandeur alone. As James floated on his back, gazing up, he felt very small, yet comfortable in his smallness. Grandeur had always comforted him, though he couldn’t say why. Even as a child, he had loved a thunderstorm, the rush of wind, the pounding of the rain heavy on a metal roof of an old country house in Maine, the sudden flash of lightning, the roll of distant thunder, even the sudden crack in the universe when a bolt streaked down close by. Yes, there was fear, an electric fear, but mixed with that was exaltation. And these enormous mountain faces rising straight from the shore gave him that same sense of awe, that strange satisfaction of being tiny in an immense universe.

And beyond the mountains themselves was the arc of the sky, a rounded vault of pure blue, not a cloud in sight, just the occasional white speck six miles up, a plane slowly and silently heading East. Yes, the sky encapsuled him, the mountains, and the sea, and all together it felt just right. And as he rolled over to return to his steady breaststroke, he realized that this, here and now, was simply happiness. The warmth of the water, the perfect sea green transparency, the gentle slosh of the mild surge against the sculpted rocks, the towering cliffs above it all, and beyond them the endless sphere of sky: what more could one ask for. James thought to himself: Yes, this is happiness. And he kept on swimming.

But though immersed in happiness, James felt, somehow, that something was wrong. But what could it be? Everything was perfect; he had never been happier in his life. Yet something nagged at him, suggesting that despite all appearances, he was not truly content. And he remembered the shocking line from Winter’s Tale: “I have drunk the wine and seen the spider in it.” But what was the spider in this joyful wine of life?

He continued to swim and to be happy, but a shadow had encroached on that happiness. He wondered about the spider. Did every glass of wine have a spider in it? Was every glass of wine poisoned? If so, by what, by whom? And as he swam in the gentle cradle of the warm Aegean, the answer came to him. Yes, there was indeed a spider in every glass of wine. The spider was inherent in the emptying of the glass. The spider was what revealed itself when the wine had been sipped, savored, and drunk to its lees. The spider was very simple in its meaning. And as he swam still wrapped in happiness, he understood the source of his unease, the origin of the invisible cloud in the sun-filled sky. The answer was as simple as a stiletto straight to the heart. The wine could be the best in the world, but once it was drunk your glass was empty. The spider in every glass was that simple realization. Nothing lasts. Everything passes away. Even the greatest happiness is limited to the here and now. If one could live utterly in the here and now one could be utterly happy and it would seem, at least, to be eternal. But consciousness condemned us to the knowledge of time. Adam and Eve did not discover good and evil when they ate the forbidden fruit. What they really discovered was time and that was what thrust them forth from paradise. And as he floated in the embrace of the Aegean sea, James understood the cause of his distress. He loved this happiness in which he was immersed, yet a shadow had crossed the sun, reminding him it could not last. Just as the sculpted rocks themselves would eventually be ground down to sand, his happiness and he with it would dissipate into the vastness of a painfully beautiful and utterly indifferent universe. James had no choice. He understood the paradox of the human condition. There was nothing to be done. And so he floated in the moment and then again, began to swim, immersed in troubled happiness, gently, stroke by stroke, going forward toward no destination at all.