Beach Fossils — Sleep Apnea

This song has its own place in my heart. Though it’s not my sole and foremost anthem for sleepless nights nor amplified sadness. The first time I heard this song was around autumn of 2019, and it was early morning at Batu Bolong beach. I had a rough night, or rather a rough semester, so when an acquaintance of mine asked me to accompany him to the western shore of the island, I complied. I barely knew him, but then I thought I needed a change of heart. Sometimes, your own head is the last place you want to be in, right?

We went to this darkened beach, called Batu Bolong. It was located in Canggu. It was very quiet, not many people were around being so late into the night. Thankfully, the darkness wasn’t perpetual, there were some lights albeit rare. We sat on the beach and started burning the night away by staring at the waves, trying to find cryptic messages in the water. Then Sleep Apnea came on the shuffle and the whiskey turns into my tears, for my tears is nothing but distilled sadness and whiskey cola. Someone lit a fire, and the sparks danced like memories, something to visualized but not to touch. Everything else was hazy and shrouded in smoke, both literally and figuratively. The sound of the waves was like the uncredited other band member, playing an instrument only he knew how to operate. Sky was gradually brightened, signalling the promise of a new dawn, but really, this new dawn lacked of hope. My thoughts still couldn’t decide which way it willed to travel to. Although I have to say, the whole experience was somehow filmworthy. I mean I could already imagine the color grading.

This, is a fossilized late-night beach visit. This, is also a fossilized sadness.