Life's A Beach

The night before last, I had a dream about an old friend. Nothing in particular happened; we were just talking, hanging out, doing all the things we used to do, going to the all the places we used to go. It was the kind of dream where I woke up smiling, but also feeling a little pang of remembrance for how easy life used to be-- and how much we took that for granted. And it was in that frame of mind that I went to the beach yesterday.

It wasn't a particularly special day. My mother-in-law happened to have the day off, and she wanted to take the kids and me to the beach with her. We left early and got breakfast on our way down, and even stopped at the new Krispy Kreme and picked up some hot, fresh doughnuts. We went to my favorite the-kids-are-with-me beach (it has a shorter boardwalk and less of a hike through the sand than most of the other public beaches around here), set up a blanket and an umbrella, and enjoyed ourselves for a few hours.

It wasn't a particularly special day. Not by any measurable standard. But, after the dream I'd had the night before, I was in a slightly sentimental, sappy mood. I love the beach. I'm especially partial to my beach, the beautiful stretch of white and emerald that runs along the Northern Gulf Coast. But I am incandescently happy on any beach. And, in my sappy, sentimental frame of mind yesterday, I took a mental trip down memory lane that had me smiling all day long.

I remembered things like the time I got the worst jellyfish sting of my life (in retrospect, it could have been a man-o-war instead of a jellyfish, but at the time I wasn't too concerned with zoology). A friend and I were floating on an inflatable raft, drifting along and minding our own business when a man, who will forever be referred to as "that creepy dude," swam up to us and started chatting us up. He tried finding out where we lived, tried inviting us to his cabin at the State Park, and just wouldn't take the "we're not really interested in talking to you" hint. Just when I reached the point where I was praying that this guy would take the hint and disappear, along floated a fool-proof get-out-of-this-conversation free pass! My arm felt like it was on fire (as did my hand when I started trying to pull the tentacle off of it), but, after assuring him that we did not need him to give us a ride to the hospital, that creepy dude finally backed off.

I remembered digging through the seats of a friend's car to find enough change so we could stop at Burger King on our way home. And the time another friend and I found a random pair of underwear on the jetty by Perdido Pass. And going to the beach with my mom and my siblings when we were little-- eating bologna and cheese sandwiches, followed up by cold slices of watermelon. We would start by having a seed-spitting contest, and it would inevitably devolve into a see-how-many-seeds-stick-when-we-spit-them-at-each-other contest. I remember the time my mom took my best friend and me to the beach-- she thought it would be a good idea to watch Jaws the night before. I wasn't worried about sharks, but the idea that there could be dismembered body parts floating around had me totally freaked out! I thought about shell-hunting after tropical storms and minor hurricanes-- the best time for shell-hunting, because all kinds of things wash up. I had my 12th birthday party at the beach. And I remembered the day I met my sister and her family at the beach with my kids and a friend and her daughter and we saw the man we will forever refer to as "Speedo Claus." (Is there really an explanation necessary?)

I cannot remember a single time I went to the beach and came home unhappy. Exhausted, yes. But never upset. It's my favorite place in the world, and it seems so fitting that so many of my favorite memories happened there. And I love knowing that every time I go, I get to make some new ones.

These pictures are mine and belong to me, and are not meant to be used by anyone other than me, for any purpose whatsoever.