Fortress of Sand

I can remember it clearly: the feeling of warm sand between my toes as the ebbing tide lapped around my ankles.

My sister and I were young then -though we liked to believe we were as grown up as our vast shadows cast by the setting sun. The two of us would sit surrounded by a ring of pebbles with the dry wind chafing our lips and the sting of seawater on our sunburnt skin.

At the centre of this ring we built our sand-made, indestructible 'fortress'- made beautiful by the cloak of our imagination. For the both of us, that not-quite-sandcastle (because it was only a mound of sand) was the heart of our kingdom. We imagined the castle walls were made of pearls and coral; that we had starfish servants and a legion of hermit crabs for an army.

Our flag was green -there were plenty of leaves lying around- while our anthem was the tune of the ice-cream van. But above all else I remember that the sky of our fantasy kingdom consisted of a myriad of colourful clouds, even though we found out later the bright shapes of colour were merely kites.

Like the kites, we discovered that reality had a hard hand. We learnt the hard way that euphoria -childhood euphoria was nothing more than a fragile illusion that would haunt us like the dying sun on the horizon.

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My English AS homework. I got 8/10 for this one. Woot! The assignment was we had to write about a childhood memory.

P/s: To whomever reads this blog, from now on I'll just upload my writing. No more personal mumbo jumbo. I have a diary for that :)