The sand, the sun, and the deep blue sea

We took the dinghy across to the dinghy dock today and in two blocks we were at the edge of the ocean. It's been a long trek to be sure, and it was with deep satisfaction that I removed my shoes and stuck my toes in the ever so cold water. We took a long walk down the beach, picking up an occasional shell and admiring the colors.

It was a stroll down memory lane for me. I spent a good bit of every summer on the beach since my dad was a professor at the University of Pittsburgh and had most of every summer off. As I walked along the water's edge, with every wave I was being washed over with images from these trips - images of my mom and dad laying on the beach before the days of divorce, images of my brothers body surfing, of my mom and I walking the high tide line picking over the shells. We were looking for that perfect treasure to sit on our shelf at home that would wake our summer senses in the middle of gray winter despair.

We walked past a fisherman with his rods propped in the sand. He hadn't caught anything today, but he got to sit there enjoying the surf so blue it nearly hurt your eyes so he reckoned as it was a good day.  He was so right. So very very right.