Sue and I have some really great friends, people who we share the most amazing memories with. As a bunch of friends we do sophisticated things together; going to the theatre and having quiet days.

Yesterday we had a day of silliness. We could have been sophisticated, but it was great to be silly. For me ‘silly’ days are those days when you sit back and you list the activities that you did and you say ‘we did what?’.

Yesterday’s day of silliness was spent in Southport. Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not saying that Southport is silly, just that we did silly things.

We started at the Botanic Gardens which are nice and pretty. Straight away the silliness set in. We hired rowing boats and rowed our way around the lake/pond/green and slimy patch of water. There are only two children in this group, the rest of us a decidedly middle-aged or definitely moving that way. But we are only middle-aged on the outside.

I have to admit that it took me a little while to get going, but once I let myself relax I was off.

After the rowing the park had even more delights. Next up, the crazy golf and from there onto the little ‘train thing’ that gives you a tour of the park (It’s really more like an old peoples buggy with a few trailers behind it). Jonathan sat there all embarrassed because one of his teachers also sat on the train. I don’t think we did anything to ease his embarrassment as we waved at every passer by (and there were lots of them).

From the Botanical Gardens we went into Southport proper, parking on the beach. Walking into town along the pier we cheered at the kids in the skater park doing their acrobatics. Some were a little coy, but most loved all the attention.

The fun wasn’t finished there though, the Jet Boat was next. Everyone in front of us had looked very calm and collected as they left the boat, we decided to bit a little less reserved about it and cheered all the way around the 2 minute course. Apparently the driver enjoyed the fact that we were enjoying it and gave us a little longer than anyone who had gone before us. Emily shouted so much that her mouth dried out and she couldn’t talk at the end.

We finished our time in Southport being the last people sat outside Costa, with the staff tiding up around us. It almost got to the point where there was one table in the middle of the street with us sat around it.

It was a great fun. I’d like to be able to say that it was like being a child again, but we never did things like that as children (not that I remember anyway).

Sometimes we can focus too much on being sophisticated, on doing things that have a purpose. Some times it’s best to do something with absolutely no purpose other than to have fun. As a Christian it is easy for me to look at the world around and to see all that needs to be done; but I firmly believe that God loves his children to enjoy life in all it’s fullness. For me days of silly fun are part of that fullness. Silly days with specials friends makes that experience so much richer.

I believe that God had a hand in creating the world we dwell in and I believe that His hand didn’t just bring form and function but also a bit of fun. As I look at creation I marvel at the strangeness and diversity of it all but I also  think that some of it looks like it has been created the way it is as a bit of fun. Sometimes that fun is just a little silly. The Hammerhead Shark may be a born killer – but it definitely looks silly.

I have always been fascinated by going to the seaside and experiencing waves. I say experiencing because you don’t watch waves you experience them. Even if I am not in the sea every one of my senses is influenced by the constant pulse of the waves.

• My eyes are drawn into their rhythm
• My ears are soothed by their tempo
• I feel the moist air and spray
• I taste the salt
• I smell the rich sea aroma

There is no escaping the presence of the wave, but yet it doesn’t assault me. It doesn’t come up and howl it’s presence. Even in the biggest storm the wave may shout, but still it is somehow strangely natural and in keeping.

Wave are remarkable. Each wave is unique; each resounding whoosh is different to every one before it and every one after it; it’s height is different; where it breaks is different; each one draws back at a different pace. Every minute of every day they drum onto millions of miles of shore and yet they are matchless.

Each of us recognises the sound of a real wave. We were told as children that the sound in the shell was the sound of the wave; but none of us were really fooled. People have tried to synthesis the sound; but we all recognise these imitations. I have a CD of classical music with wave sounds in the background; but it’s not the same.

Some of my fondest and most vivid memories are animated by the presence of waves.

As a child walking along the front (as we call it) at Hornsea in a storm I decided that I wanted to get closer to the waves. So without my parents watching a snook down one of the paths leading to the sea from the sea wall. Closer and closer a crept towards the waves. And then, without warning, one of the waves decided to come and say hello. It engulfed me. I was drenched. My mum was shouting, screaming even. I was fine, I had lived my adventure and survived.

A few summers ago we went to Florida as a family; my brother and his family were living out there. They were living in Cocoa Beach and we would have happily spent every day in the waves. We bought body-boards and spent hours trying to master those waves. Some times those waves lifted us up and dumped us onto the beach; on other times they would break on top of us. You can’t master a wave, you can only allow it to come and treat you to a ride.

Last summer we went to Quiberon in Brittany while staying with Andrew and Katharine.  What a fabulous day. Fabulous waves that we spent all day enjoying. We were tossed and tumbled and lifted off our feet and we loved it.

Just this weekend we had a barbecue on the beach at North Berwick with friends. We listened to the waves as the sun set in magnificent colours or purple, red, orange and gold. But those waves weren’t intimidated by the grandness of it all, they just continued in their cadence and in so doing amplified the whole experience.

The waves also remind me of Jesus and His power over them, His ability to still them. We stand before the wave and dance to its tune; but not Jesus.

And to finish, a poem:

I thought of you and how you love this beauty,
And walking up the long beach all alone
I heard the waves breaking in measured thunder
As you and I once heard their monotone.

Around me were the echoing dunes, beyond me
The cold and sparkling silver of the sea –
We two will pass through death and ages lengthen
Before you hear that sound again with me.

Sara Teadale