We woke up this morning and stumbled to the beach together. The sky glowed light pink to the East. Rough, cold sand taunted our feet with each step – a million tiny insults wearing away our armor of skin. I remembered our wedding day, on the East Coast, at the beach, at sunrise – dolphins frolicking, surfers running, volleyballers lobbing. All of our guests stood in the surf and tossed small polished stones into the Atlantic– a dozen plus wishes, prayers and hopes – tossed into the great mystery with an expectation of rippling returns from them all – toward us and away from us – in all directions – a hum of blessings reverberating throughout our married life.
This beach and our times here have been a part of that blessing – hearing the waves, walking the seashore, discovering tossed aside treasure from either the ocean or the people who come to enjoy it – a driftwood whale, coral, clamshell bedecked with “barnacles,” ½ of a large shell perfectly intact and a broken tent that provided 1 hour of covered bliss by the ocean before snapping in two, again, with a gust of ocean breeze. I will miss this place, the morning sun on the waves, how the surf breaks and then recedes – second-guessing if it is too bold or if cloyingly taking what it wants bit-by-bit fits its purposes more.
Yet the ending must come and a return to an earthen horizon – a beach replaced with clay and grass – the echo of generations swaying in the tall pines, cedars and oaks - a different reverberation of our lives and our blessings in the rocky ridge.
(4/12,14/21, 3/3/23)