The Space Between the Waves

A new life in Washington D.C.

My wife would stand by the ocean and close her eyes, listening for the space between the waves. There, she would say, was the essence of life. It was the peace we all sought. In that moment of silence.

I told the story to our friends gathered on the beach at 34th Street in Newport Beach, California, on Wednesday evening. I asked them all to close their eyes. And think of Michelle.

At that very time, a pod of dolphins swam right past us, close to shore.

On our daily runs along the beach, we had seen dolphins. They were Michelle’s favorite animals. After Wednesday, we didn’t see another one.

The weight that pressed heavily on my chest since her passing in England nine months ago was gone. She was finally home…

In Washington, the city I now call home, Donald Trump was plotting his strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities. In a world already fraught with danger and jeopardy, the U.S. president lost patience with diplomacy and chose bombs instead. War Not Peace.

I was in California this week looking for a different kind of peace.

Michelle’s death in September 2024 after a long battle with breast cancer took its toll on my family. The quiet after the storm of emotions that engulfed us all proved the most difficult to cope with. In our different ways, we were all lost in the silence.

Back at the beginning of October, the memorial to her life at St Mary’s Church in Tetbury, a Cotswolds town in the English countryside where we lived, was intensely emotional and beautiful. But it wasn’t what Michelle wanted.

We rarely talked about death, not even when it was close. I don’t think she ever accepted that it could happen. But Michelle did say she wanted to be buried in a mulch bag and give sustenance to trees and plants. It was kind of a joke, but she was deadly serious. We never had a proper plan, and when it came to carrying out her wishes, I couldn’t do it. There were no mulch burials, but there are natural sites in Britain where you can arrange for loved ones to nourish wildflowers and wildlife. It was just too real for us, I guess.

So I conformed, and agreed to the one thing she said she didn’t want: a cremation. In retrospect, it was the coward’s choice. At the time, it was all I could handle. I even backed down and invited someone to the cemetery who had hurt her in the weeks before she died. I understand now that I will never have her strength. Strong people do what is right, not what is easy or convenient.

We planted a tree in the garden, and some of her ashes helped it flower in the Spring. But while Michelle was back in the land of her birth, she was far from the land where she was happiest.

Our children were 7, 4, and 18 months old when we moved to Newport Beach after four years in New York. We went West for six months or until our money ran out. We stayed for 25 years.

We found a small beach house on 19th Street, one block from the Pacific Ocean on one side and half a block to the bay on the other. The children all went to Newport Elementary, a school on the boardwalk with a blacktop on the beach. We lived in our boardshorts and bikinis.

Every morning, I’d see a bare-chested dad, long hair flying in the wind, as he rode his kids to school on a rusty old beach cruiser. I’d ask him how he was. “So far, so good,” he’d say. That was always good enough for me.

We were regulars at two-for-one margarita night at Sharkeez until we realized the reason for the arguments we had every Wednesday night on the walk home. One full-priced cocktail wasn’t as good a deal, but better for the marriage.

Mickey’s surfer friends would sleep at our house to catch the early waves. Michelle once opened a closet to find an eight-year-old boy sleeping standing up. It was that small.

We walked Snoop Dogg, our fearsome pet shop Chihuahua, by the water every morning and night, stopping at the donut shop for coffee and turning around just past 34th Street. There would often be dolphins. Sometimes we would even see whales. Always, there would be surfers.

The two sons of our English friend, Julie, would often be surfing the break outside their home. Young and carefree. Their only worry the next wave.

It was really Michelle’s dream to go to California. I wouldn’t have done it without her. The idea was something romantic to cling to during a difficult childhood. She saw ‘Grease’ so many times that she needed it to come true.

We stayed in that tiny house that also served as my office for eight years before moving to Huntington Beach, Laguna Beach, and Big Bear Lake, and eventually back to England after Michelle fell sick.

As the days and weeks turned into months after Michelle died, it became clear to us that we still had unfinished business. As much as Michelle loved Tetbury and all the wonderful people we met there, she would often talk of returning to the ocean. It was her happy place.

So that’s what we decided to do. We arranged a paddle out for Michelle.

The paddle out is a surfing tradition. When someone in the surfing community dies, their friends paddle out into the ocean wearing flower leis. Just for once, it’s not about catching waves. They form a circle, share some stories, splash the water in joy, and throw the garlands from around their necks. Then they commend their loved one to the sea gods.

When Blake, one of our friend Julie’s surfing sons, passed away a few years ago, we attended a paddle out for him on the 34th Street beach. It was wonderfully life-affirming despite the enormity of the family’s loss. Our daughter, Savannah, sang ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’ to her late friend from a platform on the sand.

Last weekend, I flew out from D.C., and my daughters, Jazmin and Savannah, came from England with their partners, Bruce and Kieran. Mickey, our eldest child, still lives in California. We would spend the week together celebrating Michelle’s life, culminating in the Hawaiian-style ceremony.

We stayed together in a house in Encinitas, an old-fashioned beach town just north of San Diego. It has a 180-degree view of the ocean below. We ran every morning together, and we surfed. We had dinner each night on the patio overlooking the water.

Despite my joy at being reunited, my heart was heavy, and my breathing was unusually labored. I wanted to feel renewed, but I felt defeated. In Washington, I had been able to move forward, but the grief in my chest lurking just below the skin had returned, and the tears were always waiting. Michelle was everywhere. Not as she was when I saw her last. But relaxed and laughing. A young mother truly happy for the first time. I had looked forward so much to being back with my kids in this special place, and now I couldn’t get out of my own head.

On several occasions, the loneliness overwhelmed me even though I was with the people I loved. All my hopes and dreams were wrapped up with the same woman for over 40 years. And the California Michelle had never really been ill, although she was diagnosed with cancer there. She was sun-kissed. Stunning.

I have close friends I can talk to. I am lucky. Life is looking after me. And I don’t want to forget anything. My children are the same. But we have to move forward. We can’t get so lost in the past that it closes off our futures.

On the morning of the paddle out, my mood was the worst it has been since the days after Michelle died. We didn’t know how many people would turn up; I wasn’t sure what to say, and it felt like we were ripping off a band-aid just at a time the hurt had started to heal.

But gradually, everything slotted into place until the universe aligned. The beach began to fill with familiar faces, many carrying their surfboards. Jazmin had ordered leis for everyone from Hawaii, and Julie provided all those little touches that Michelle would have remembered. A simple wooden table covered with photos and flowers, and food was our temple on the sand. Surfboards were the pews.

And when the time came, the words were waiting for me. This was the beach where we raised our family. We were finally doing Michelle’s wishes. This was what she would have wanted. She hated being the center of attention. She wouldn’t have wanted all the ceremony of the memorial, as beautiful as it was. She didn’t like crematoriums. She never wanted a surprise party.

She would have loved the casual elegance of friends walking onto the beach in their shorts and sundresses to say goodbye. Some had their dogs, others their kids. They were smiling. And then so was I, and I saw my children relax.

After watching the dolphins swim by, some friends shared their memories of Michelle, and Jazmin read a prayer she wrote for her mom. She was shaking as she read it, but it was heartfelt and immensely profound. I can’t bear that my children have had their mother taken from them. I can hardly stand the pain I feel coming from them. It hurts more than mine ever could.

We quietly collected our leis and our boards, and we stood together on the edge of the ocean as the sun lowered in the sky. There were old friends from the neighborhood, from school, people we worked with, people we loved.

We paddled over the swell, the crashing waves the only sound. Some watched from the shore. A circle formed, and we sat on our boards. The waves softened and slowed. Suddenly, it was still.

One of Jazmin’s friends paddled around hanging out single white roses.

I called to the gods of the sea to look after my wife, and Savannah led us singing Bob Marley’s ‘Three Little Birds (Don’t Worry About a Thing).’

One by one, we threw our leis into the center of the circle.

Mickey said a poem he wrote on a scrap of paper and scattered Michelle’s ashes into the water. We sat for a moment before splashing and screaming her name in a noisy outburst of pure exuberance.

It was time to paddle back in. We had done what we were supposed to do. We had brought Michelle back to the ocean she loved.

Three nights later, Trump attacked Iran. We will see how that ends. Not well, I fear. I have been chronicling this presidency for five months now, and very little that has happened has been for the better. Good people across the country are living in fear of what this administration will do next. The same goes now to good people around the world.

I am on a plane back to Washington. I will never leave Michelle behind; she will always be with me. But we have returned her to the beaches and the ocean of her dreams.

There is a lightness to that; we all feel it.

Whenever I am standing on the precipice in the years to come, I will close my eyes and listen for the space between the waves.

And I will think of Michelle. And smile.