I wanted to talk about freedom in the "Land of the Free." Apparently, Americans are great dreamers to place such a ghostly word next to the name of their country.

Freedom is temporary and constantly changing. It is the most reliable thing in the world, and at the same time, you can never rely on it. It turns into dependency too easily if you want too much from it.

By the way, it doesn't exist.

And since that's the case, all that's left is to pretend it does... It lives very close to your imagination.

I keep my freedom only for myself. It's when you don't need anyone and yet you need everyone.

I want to scatter my things on the sand, smear myself with oil that is almost boiling from the sun in a plastic bottle. Tiny grains of sand stick to the bottom, my fingers slip, and so the spray nozzle won't press down. While I stand, my feet sink into the sand, and I feel as if I'm standing on a bonfire.

Running my fingers through my salty hair, I regret that, like many others, I don't like it when salt sticks to my body—I want to find fresh water as soon as possible.

In the mornings, my hair and skin take on a golden-bronze hue; in the evening, crimson highlights lie on them like a blush.

I dream of these sunsets with clearly defined lines, as if drawn with a graphite pencil, or others—blurred by rain and storm clouds. I still dream of them.

As soon as the sun leaves the beach, we leave it too.

The first meeting with the ocean was the most memorable. It seemed to have donned its best colors and forced everything around it to dress up too. The sky and the sand—an absolute intertwining of opposites.

It was impossible to keep track of the changing weather. But we were happy with any weather.

Julia prepared a surprise for us—a trip on her yacht to the yacht club, where we had lunch with her whole family.

Julia herself lives in the city of Venice. It is called Venice because all the houses stand by the water, and yachts are moored to them.

Whether once a week or once a month, in Sarasota you can see lines of cars flocking to Fruitville Road.

People walk along the wide avenues, squinting from the sun every other step. They sort through glossy fruits and vegetables with hands wet from the heat, and the sellers tie tight knots on plastic bags and wish everyone a good day.

Florists handle the stems with the faces of surgeons. I liked this one the most. She trimmed the stems of her flowers as if she were performing an operation. Sometimes I thought she was wearing gloves. I think everyone around was smiling, but she wasn't.

If you didn't know what was happening here, you might think there was a dog show nearby. The dogs were one better-fed and better-groomed than the other.

To appease customers, sellers pour water into bowls for their pets, and they lick them up with large pink tongues. I'm not very good with dog breeds, but this huge black cloud won me over. Can anyone tell me what breed it is?

Smiling vendors under tents lay out jewelry made of glass and leather. A van with painted lemons pulls up to the farthest part of the street. Seeing me with a camera, a man in a yellow t-shirt calls me over and gives me some lemonade to try. Honestly, drinking such lemonade had always been my childhood dream! Moreover, it exceeded all my expectations.

I really wanted to try other flavors and buy a whole glass, but the girls had already run ahead, so I had to catch up with them.

Waves gently covered the shore, licking it further and further toward the city. The tide was just beginning. But we only guessed about it because a tropical downpour was mercilessly pounding on roofs, asphalt, and leaves. It turned umbrellas inside out. It penetrated inside clothes, under dresses and raincoats. It changed direction, quieted down, sped up, as if joking, slapping the asphalt and calming down... This tropical rain has a capricious, strange character.

In Sarasota, rain rarely ruins anyone's plans, if only because it ends as suddenly as it begins. It's better to wait until its flash of anger subsides.

So much water that if it weren't for the croissant-shaped city, from which you can see hotels and houses, it would seem that there is nothing but water around. In the place where yesterday we carried beach bags barefoot, jumping from the scorching sand, now everything is flooded. Women in transparent floor-length pareos lift them up, and along with the pareos, their shoulders rise, and the corners of their lips drop from displeasure. Men slap along in rubber flip-flops with a towel over their shoulder, and with every step, a squelching, croaking sound is heard.

Seagulls cool their stick-like legs in the rainwater.

I love sunrises because I rarely see them. Firstly, because of the foggy weather, and secondly, because I'm more of an owl. The hardest part is forcing yourself to get up early, even though you've been working for two months before that, and your body craves rest.

There's not a soul on the bridge yet.

Waiting for the sun to explode the sky, to wake it up. It is not timid, not fearful. It appears and says, "Love me, fear me!" From such unprecedented heat, the clouds are covered with a thick blush, which only turns redder with each new gust of the sun to soar upward...

And the sun wakes everyone up, lifts them! Runners are met more and more often, cars, not yet having turned off their headlights, flash and honk at us. The ocean, which a few minutes ago remained on the sidelines of the morning bustle, also woke up and got rowdy...

I managed to take a couple of shots before the sun had already soared above the houses and looked like a large yolk. And the clouds rebelled that they had been woken up early, that they had rallied and become a stormy sky. They were carried in our direction so quickly that it already seemed that in a few minutes we would have to run to the car, wrapping the camera in a towel.

But the clouds and the sun managed to agree—as if drawn with a compass, a conciliatory rainbow appeared...

I need to keep going back. To the place where people sit on benches and they recognize me. To the place where clouds don't eat the ocean, and in general, there is no ocean there...

If you want to be free, you will have to constantly lie to yourself. And if you truly want freedom, learn to deceive yourself first.