Every time we walk along a beach some ancient urge disturbs us

The naturalist and philosopher Loren Eiseley once spoke words of haunting beauty when he declared: “Every time we walk along a beach some ancient urge disturbs us so that we find ourselves shedding shoes and garments or scavenging among seaweed and whitened timbers like the homesick refugees of a long war.” In this single image, he binds together the memory of our species, the call of the sea, and the wounds of exile. It is a vision of humanity as a people forever restless, forever longing to return to the waters from which we came.

The beach is no ordinary place. It is the meeting of two worlds: the land that gave us cities and harvests, and the sea that cradled the earliest life. When we step upon its shifting sands, something stirs in the depths of memory, an urge older than language. We shed our shoes not out of whimsy, but because some ancient part of us remembers when our ancestors crept from the oceans onto the land, and part of us longs to return. To touch the surf is to touch our own beginnings, to feel that we are not merely citizens of soil but also children of water.

Eiseley’s image of refugees of a long war speaks to the exile of humanity. For in leaving the sea, we gained much—lungs for air, hands for tools, voices for speech—but we also left behind the cradle of our birth. And like all who leave a homeland, we carry both pride in our journey and sorrow for our loss. The sea is thus like a mother left behind; when we approach it, we feel both the grief of separation and the yearning of memory. We scavenge the driftwood and the shells as though piecing together fragments of a forgotten home.

History too has mirrored this longing. Think of the great voyagers of Polynesia, who set forth upon the ocean with little more than canoes and stars. They were not afraid of the sea, for they knew themselves to be at home upon it. Their journeys across the Pacific were acts of courage, but also of return—an answering of the call that Eiseley speaks of. In their wanderings, they embodied humanity’s ancient bond with the water, showing that the exile of the sea is never complete.

Or consider the story of Odysseus, who wandered the seas for ten years after Troy. Though he longed for Ithaca, he could never escape the call of the waves. His journey was not only a punishment of the gods, but a symbol of man’s endless restlessness. Like Odysseus, when we walk along the shore, some part of us feels both at home and in exile, torn between the land we inhabit and the sea that shaped our beginnings. Eiseley gives voice to this paradox with his image of homesick refugees, forever torn between past and present.

The deeper meaning is that our urge to return to the sea is more than biology—it is a reminder of our place in the great story of life. The ocean was our first home, and when we walk its edge, we remember not only our own birth, but the birth of the world itself. This memory is both humbling and ennobling: humbling because it shows how small and ancient we are, ennobling because it ties us to the vast lineage of life that has endured countless struggles, countless “wars,” to survive.

Therefore, let this wisdom endure: do not ignore the stirring when you walk upon the beach. Feel it fully, for it is the echo of your own history. Let it remind you that you are both fragile and enduring, both exile and heir. And in your daily life, when you feel restless or lost, remember that this longing is part of being human. Embrace it not as weakness but as a call to seek, to explore, to remember. For we are all, as Eiseley says, refugees of a long war—and in honoring that truth, we discover both our ancient past and our enduring strength.