Ocean Glass
Anagyri, sitting on the beach. Revel in the blues of the spring Aegean. How many shades of blue? Count them? Try. The almost pinky blue of misty sky with sun through it, the blue of distant mainland mountains, lavender-sad beneath the sky, the almost-white blue of the sea mist lying at the mountains’ feet, marking a division between sea and land like a discarded veil of thinnest stuff, the dark navy blue of the sea’s deeps far out; the azure of the coastal water over rocks, the jade of water close in over sand. So many shades, I put the camera by. No technology can capture this. No paint can do it justice. But with the eye - click - imprint it onto brain and now scribble frantically with the pen (blue on white) to try and keep these colours pure and clear. Already they are fading.
Spetsis, walking through the town, seeking fish and bread, vegetables and wine. See the shops waiting for the tourists full of tat of that universal kind, expensive trinkets. Is there nothing truly of this place to light on? Nothing to take home in remembrance? Strange if true. The plastic sandals and sunglasses are international now, but there is always something - Ah! Deep in a window, easy to miss, behind clutter and covered in dust are little bottles of glass. Glass the colours of the sea and sky. Rush into the shop, trip over the step, arrive at the dusty window alcove almost panicked. The bottles are strangely shaped, no two the same, hand-made, sinuous, the molten glass still evident in the finished article. They are the liquid Aegean caught and held. Each one carries within it a different aspect of Grecian blue. There are so many. How to choose? How many can safely be clutched on a lap, like eggs, for five hours on the plane? Pick up one carefully, carefully - and then another. Pick each one up and hold it to the meagre light. A nest of blue eggs pillaged with awe.
But to have the sea and sky here, palpable, proves too much. Paralysed by indecision retreat through the dusky shop into the white hot street. Feel almost tearful at this nest of blueness. It feels somehow wrong to take some, leave others; wrong to take any from the place of their inspiration.
On the last day wait sadly on the Dapia for the Dolphin to Athens, entranced by Grecian blues for the last time. On yet another perfect day they are laid out from the quay to the horizon; the complex blues of the sea and a sky somewhere between turquoise and lapis. Remember the nest of ocean glass.
Ten minutes of magic only remain before the ferry comes. The crowd of travellers is growing thick. Abandon baggage, rush back the few yards into town and through the tiny street. Whirl into the shop - no trip this time - and lay hands, arbitrarily, on two pieces of solidified Aegean amongst the many. The man with the golden tooth wants so little for the treasures, wraps them with such tenderness. It seems again like theft. Carry the fragile prize in both arms back to the quay, heart pounding. Guard them the whole way home from careless knocks and zealous, as if they are something magical - as, perhaps, they are. Unwrap them lovingly at home and set them up where sunbeams fall and cats and accidents are most unlikely. Stand back smiling.
Can they bring their magic to a British windowsill?
Page(s) 42-43
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