I was walking with my boyfriend along a beach. There were beautiful cliffs to my left, and the ocean was lapping at the sand to my right. The sun was warm on my skin, and his hand held mine tightly as we watched a little girl running in the water. She was about three years old with long curly brown hair. She laughed as the ocean spray hit her chubby cheeks and turned back to look at us - spinning in her soaked sundress. I had never seen anyone so happy, and I had never been so happy.
We had climbed down naturally-hewn steps in the cliffs about a mile back and had been walking along this perfect white-sanded beach for almost an hour, stopping occasionally to inspect seashells or laugh and run around.
As I was watching this little girl, I looked to my right, and saw a huge wave on the horizon. I pointed it out to my boyfriend and ran to pick up the little girl. I looked back in desperation at the mile we had come. I could barely see the stairs in the distance; I knew we would never make it.
And so, with no equipment and no experience, I began climbing the cliff wall. My boyfriend climbed beside me, and the little girl clung to my neck, wedged between my body and the cliff face. I climbed and climbed and climbed, and woke up before we ever reached the top.
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