This is an unofficial collection of people you can find on the beach during daylight hours. The demographic significantly fluctuates with the yogis of early morning and the vampires of late night beach visits.
The old man wearing a gravity-defying Speedo that desperately clings to his sagging skin. He has an Oompa Loompa complexion (you know, the original Oompa Loompas) that is not humanly possible to achieve, as if his life consists only of exiting his beach bungalow with the first ray of sunlight and applying spray tan during the evening. To include him may verge on cliché, but to leave him out leaves us with an incomplete demographic.
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The fitness buffs, picturesquely leaping across the beach, like gazelles with headphones.
The one fully-clothed person, and the enigmatic energy that follows him or her. How did he/she get here? Was he/she expecting to find himself/herself at the beach? Where is he/she walking to? Why khakis?
A small army of dreamcatcher belly button rings. Their popularity makes them practically human, much like running into old friends, frenemies, or mortal enemies depending on your personal taste.
A group of three girls glued to their towels, anywhere between the ages of 12-39, who look like they are clones of each other, but are really just uncannily similar friends. They are there before you get there, and stay after you leave. You think they might be dead, if it weren’t for them rolling over every half an hour.
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That borderline albino teenager that is so out of place, you feel like you are experiencing an encounter with the fourth kind. He dons swim trunks that are so long they could double as pants. He can be seen running from the shade of the umbrella to the ocean over and over, as if being exposed to direct sunlight for a stationary instant will make him disintegrate. Which, it very well might. You hate to judge, yet you feel a general sense of malaise, because you know even SPF 2000 sunscreen will not save him from his decision to go shirtless.
The two people that probably met a week ago, and just came to the beach to be seen with their new boo-thangs. What better place to debut their relationship that will probably only last a week more than in the most public, nearly naked place they can think of? The girl looks at everyone but the guy walking next to her with a glare bearing the paradoxical depths of “yes, check us out,” and “what are you looking at?” Meanwhile, the guy looks at nothing but the girl, and hello, handsy!
The nearly extinct species of people that still wear goggles.
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The group of guys, at least one tattoo between them, with an ingenious and enviable beach set-up. They have a tent, chairs, radio, cooler, things you never thought of like TOMS beer-holders, and you half-expect a plasma screen. If you set up camp by them, you live vicariously through the (perhaps literal) shot of celebration they bring to the already carefree beach. Their red Solo cups are an extension of their bodies — it is 10 a.m. on a Tuesday.
The married couple on the verge of their 15+ year anniversary walking the shoreline to eternity. They are holding their flip-flops in one hand, each other’s hands, and they look so damn peaceful. If they sprouted a third hand, it would be holding a margarita. Notice how kids are nowhere to be found, as if they have an anti-kids force field around them.
The girl with the polka dot bikini. It is unlikely that it’s the color yellow, but it is most likely itty-bitty.
Putting aside the obvious reasons why the beach is awesome, the people-watching make the beach the best game of “I Spy” ever. You will likely encounter the above classics, as well as the one-time characters you wouldn’t believe unless you saw them yourself.
Next time you are at the beach, don’t only soak in the sun, soak in the scenery.
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