From ripples come waves, and from waves come ripples.
A low-pressure system forms in the Pacific, 4,000 miles away from shore, its winds churning waters into chaotic ripples. This generates a powerful swell that unifies as it diametrically moves away from its source, focusing its energies for an epic journey ahead.
The swell's frequencies organize and align naturally, its longer wavelengths powerfully rolling though the waters with a force that can only be matched by the Tide itself. The weaker wavelengths are overtaken, some of which simply dissipate into the deep. The swell's arrival to the nearshore ramp of earth is heralded by an abrupt rising and falling of the water surface as the ocean's veil is removed, unable to hide its energetic secrets any longer.
Marching forward to their destiny, the waves rise up and crest, while the offshore winds push their top layers in opposition, sending a pulse of diamonds into the sky that cascade down like a rainstorm in May. Underneath, the invisible trough lashes kelp fields and churns its way through the seafloor sediments. Finally, the advance wave's crest can no longer be held back, and it curves forward onto itself, eating it's own energy as it barrels toward a final crescendo.
In this rolling animated space of the tidal zone, dolphins, shorebirds and even man have adapted to harness this source of power and momentum to slide their way gracefully along the wave's face, with and without friction, dancing to a joyful tune that many can see but a select few can truly can understand.
At long last, the wave crashes completely, sending seafoam and spray into the air as the wave's energy impacts the shore. Like marbles spilling onto a hardwood floor, it spreads, sharing itself with the sand and rocks and oysters and shells that comprise that tidal zone's furthest reach. Then, all forward movement ceases.
In that final moment, the tide places claim to the remnants of the wave, cradling and drawing its waters back into the saltwater womb, revealing ephemeral miniature ripples in the sand that you can either marvel at or ignore, while standing 4,000 miles from the very spot where the low-pressure system initiated that wave's journey.
