Each January for a week, my family stays in a rickety shack in Second Valley, and I spend every day in that perfect ocean. Exploring the coves, snorkelling the reefs, wading through the cool, calm water. And every year since I was 10, I’ve jetty-jumped as much as possible. I love the feeling of flight before I hit the water and sink deep under the surface, eyes squeezed shut. I climb onto the rusted railing and jump from up there just to fly longer, sink deeper, just to have one more feeling. It’s one of my favourite things about our annual trips. One year, a stingray swam right next to me after a jump. Another year, hundreds of tiny, adorable squid were migrating through second valley. I jumped in with them, because they didn’t seem to mind. Each year, I dive deep down to grab handfuls of sand, I get caught in rips, I watch wankers in their yachts, and assholes on jet skis. Everything washes away with the waves, though. Every feeling and trouble floats on by like the squid and the stingrays. I am the pristine water, these kind animals, and the ever-shifting sand that line the perfect beaches along the Spencer Gulf. I am them.

I am not this algal bloom. This water-poisoner, fish-suffocator, air-polluter. I’m the living, breathing ocean before any of this came to be. My waters are gentle and sweet and unequivocally alive. My seabeds are home to cities of coral and fish. My shores welcome bare feet and lost goggles. I can’t be this algal bloom. I cannot be an output of global warming, because my whole life I’ve been fighting against it. I’m the counter of this algal bloom because I won’t let climate change end me. I’m not the reason this Earth is dying. I did not cause the water to heat up, or spread an excess of nutrients into the waterways. I’m not the one who spilled oil, dumped nuclear waste, burned gas, or cut down rainforests. I knew I hated John Howard before I knew my times tables. I protested for renewable energy before I learned division. Politicians give me lists of things to do to help the beaches and I reply sternly, “I am not the problem, Senator.” I didn’t ignore science for the sake of profit, or lobbying, or fear of change. I didn’t ask to be born into a generation that is doomed, but I live, nonetheless. The ocean and I live in spite of the algal bloom, together. ”We are not the problem, Mr Prime Minister,” the ocean and I say. But right now, he cannot hear us.

At 16 years old, I’ve never seen snow, just baked in the forever summer heat. Now, standing at the edge of the water, I’m looking around and the foam covers everything in sight. Endless, fluffy white clouds line the coast and I’m thinking, maybe I’ve seen snow now. I can’t know what it’s like but I have to imagine it’s the same. At 16, I’ve seen the algal bloom destroy beaches along my hometown. I’ve seen dead fish, sick dogs, green water, and white foam. All before I’ve ever seen the snow.

When I was 13, I was hurt by someone to the point it changed me as a person, and I sought solace in the waters of Ramindjeri ruwi. My mum and I found a tiny cove along the Heysen trail and I felt, for the first time, afraid of the ocean, because I knew this shore was going to transform me. I knew it the moment my feet touched the sand. I stripped down to my underwear and, after hesitating for a moment, ran into the water. It was freezing cold and harsh, rocky walls surrounded me. I stared out onto Karta Pitingga, a land carved out by Ngurunderi and the resting place of Tjilbruke’s nephew; a distant island rich with stories and spirits. I think Ngurunderi built this cove with purpose, this water was made to help people, to change people, to heal. I looked at white birds flying above me, seeking out Karta Pitingga. I saw clouds forming a thick blanket across the darkening sky. I had a choice to make – I could return to the shore and stay broken, but comfortable. Or I could dive down. And as my body forced itself under the water, my soul let out a guttural shout, “I am here,” my heart cried out, “I’m back.” And the sea threw me around, and screamed when I screamed, and sank when I sank, and changed when I changed. I kept diving down, the waters embracing me, skin surrounded by the ocean’s resounding voice replying, “Thank god,” the ocean holding me tight and crying, “I’ve got you.”

I was three years old when I tried to convince my mums I could breathe underwater, forcing my head beneath the surface until they’d pull me back up, saving my life. They sent me straight to swimming lessons, rightfully terrified. And it was after those lessons I learned I really could breathe underwater. My toes grew a webbing and my limbs became covered in scales, my neck sprouted gills that let me swim for hours on end. Everything else in the world fell away, my heartbeat steadied in its soulplace, my body stretched out wide and long. My nerves were static, desperate to feel each tiny pull and push of the water around me. I could breathe. I could finally breathe.

I miss swimming in the ocean more than I’ll ever understand. I feel like I’ve lost a part of myself, something urgent and vital. My mother earth is calling out to me, but I can’t quite make out the words. My mother earth is reaching out to me, but I’m too far away to touch. I’m staring up at this precious night sky and I wish on a shooting star that the algal bloom will soon go away. Deep down, I know it’s not a shooting star, but Musk’s Starlink Satellites. I choose to make the wish anyway. I walk back inside, hiding from the sky. The algae will stay another day.