They run for the water, tossing sun hats for goggles. I stop them and they give me ho hums as I make them put on their PFD's, for the sign reads Strong Current and those words make me feel achy deep down in my bones. And then they are off again like bright fish swimming in clear sea-glass green water.
Sully came running out of the gentle waves with long strands of green and brown sea grasses stuck to his legs, waving a piece of treasured shell at me. He crawled up into my lap with saltwater dripping from his eyelashes. "Can I have this shell, Mama?" Yes, I say. "You mean I can bring this shell home with me, Mama? I can keep it?" Of course, I say.
The day was spent under lazy, swaying palms. Pelicans and gulls flew overhead and just under fish scale clouds. Sully sat next to me with a cheap plastic bucket shaped like a sandcastle full of water, sand, sea grass, one tiny silver fish and one black crab no bigger than the tip of my thumb with orange-ish legs and two beady eyes. The school of exploration I dream about for them.
Where the water laps up and then spills back over and rolls out is where I planted myself in the ocean today. I sat there and watched my family and waited for the familiar to take over, and it did. Always does.
