To the SEA

Finding your tribe is about expanding your world, says Tanya Meeson

- Tanya Meeson

Sarah was the one who alerted me to it first. ‘Isn’t it weird how it’s always women?’ she said as we bobbed in the gentle, cool waters of False Bay. It was early morning, still summer, and the first people in the water were us and about four other women. ‘It’s like, as we age, we all just want to migrate back to the ocean.’

We laughed and moved on to other matters of consequence: The colour of her toenail polish, the highs and lows of work, love and family. But it struck me then that the strangers and friends I’ve shared my early-morning paddles with for years have been, overwhelmingly, women. In fact, this space was almost exclusively occupied by older women before Instagram and cold-water dips made it fashionable. ‘But what do you do?’ Sherry’s husband asked her. ‘We just bob and talk.’