The ocean wrapped around the Maine coast as if cradled by it. My brother and I would begin the day by going on an early morning walk along the beach front during which we would scout for the perfect site of our sand castle. It was more of a fort, really-once we were finished we would be standing in a hole a few feet down with tall walls of sand and trenches encircling us. We always spent the whole day working on our fort, purposefully building it beneath the tide line so that later in the day we could defend it from the ceaseless onslaught of waves sent out by the Atlantic.

My energy back then seemed boundless in a way that only children, untamed by the world, can contain. Once we had gone far down the beach, I would sprint across the shoreline and then circle a spot that seemed suitable and where we would have the least disruption while building our fort. Isaac and I had an unspoken pact that we would meet any strangers that came upon us with distaste-we were shy and didn't want to interact with anyone else. But ulterior to this was the fact that, according to the beach rules that were plastered blatantly at the main entrance, deep holes and trenches such as ours were a safety hazard and were prohibited. I remember that we came up with a plan: if we were ever confronted by a lifeguard who happened to wander far down along the beach and happen upon us, we would pretend that we were foreign and spoke no English, and we would respond to them in broken and nonsensical Hebrew phrases until left alone. This was just one of things that we would pretend when digging. When we were younger, we acted as if we were digging for buried treasure, or that we were archaeologists looking for fossils, or even that we were construction workers making a foundation for a skyscraper.

Our fort was simple in design, and we kept it to the basics, but by afternoon it seemed unyielding. We shoveled until we were far below the surface of the beach, and stood hunkered in our mock bunker filled with damp sand. Our sand fort building techniques advanced as we got older and more experienced: we pretended that wet sand worked like cement, we tried to "water-proof" the walls with seaweed, and we fortified our structures with sticks and shells. We took breaks occasionally to cool off in the ocean, but looked upon the task of erecting a fort as our primary objective for which we came to the beach. We liked the excitement of defending the fort from the ocean, and treated it as a battle against the tides and against nature. Once the Atlantic advanced across enemy lines, Isaac and I used to build ditches and walls as if our lives depended on it.

Being the younger sibling, my brother was my superior in the imaginary army we had created. He would shout demands-build another trench, build up the back wall higher. Without failure however, each onslaught of waves would find a way to trickle into our pit after breaching a weak spot in one of our walls. In this mock battle, we were always on the losing side, but we didn't care; we were only intrigued by the possibility that maybe one day, our structure would be so full of sand that no wave would be able to topple it. But as we worked, I could always hear the soft noise of sloshing of waves against sand, steadily eroding our masterpiece.

Each year we went back to Maine and went over the same routine, always building our fort a little bit grander, and always holding our own against the tide for a little bit longer. Eventually, my brother turned 13, and became too old to continue to endeavor in such childish practices, and I became the sole operator of our once mutual venture.

That year, I was forced to construct the fort on my own and spent hours fighting back the tide without Isaac. Soon, however, a sandy vortex of sea water swirled around my feet as I piled more sand in vain onto the melting fort behind me. The sun was setting around us, and my family wanted to leave the beach for the day. My brother motioned to me, and together we abandoned what we had once enjoyed so much.