Dusk, Shore Walk

 I don't own a boat, I've never owned a boat...I'm not even really a big "boat person" but they sure are peaceful to look at, floating by the docks, all ready for seafaring adventure. I have a boat photograph that I'm trying to work up the nerve to paint, and some day I will have the guts to give it a spin and try putting boat-happiness on paper.

 Spent the dusky, muggy evening strolling the shore, at a park near the marina. Geese and swans, the lighthouse in the disance the last of the golden sun, and boats galore....

 Old men in boats are extra cute. Maybe I'll get a boat to putter around in when we're old. As long as he'll take me along on misty evenings near the shore.

Impromtu Beach Stop

 Mama saw a taco truck. Mama pulled over. Mama told the boys to put on their bathing suits. Mama bought some tacos. The Beach + A Taco Truck??? Crazy cool.

 There's a lot of sea lettuce on the shore right now at this particular spot, and so you had to find a clear spot or wade tip-toe through it to get to the open water. Love that my boys aren't to prissy to handle it.

 You can see why it got the name it did. I hear it's edible. I've never tried. I don't actually personally like sea veggies unless they're on the outside of my sushi.....at least as far as I have tried.

 Isn't this red kind pretty? Anybody know their seaweeds? I need to learn their names.

 There was a little wading, which became a little splashing, and a few falls...no harm done. Just slightly more damp  on the ride home. We don't mind a little sea water.

Found a lot of scallop shells at this beach right now too....interesting to see how the natural detritus changes over the season and location to location. We don't have many scallop shells near our house, we have whelks (Look! I know a new one!) and lots of oysters and mussels.

We sat and ate our tacos, watched the freighters unloading across the harbor, launched a few driftwood ships and then hopped back across the sand to our car. First impromptu beach session of the year? Check!

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Autumnal Beach Explore

We took a little picnic lunch down to the shore that is a stone's throw from our house and had what I was calling at first the "Last Beach Outing of the Year." Heh. What was I thinking? It was gorgeous. Not super sunny and not over warm (high fifties) but there was no real wind and it was warm enough to be quite comfortable in our light jackets.

We explored a new beach we'd never been to (fun to learn our new neighborhood a little more), ate peanut butter in jelly in a hurried way and then spent a long time exploring the edge of the tide. So much wonderful stuff had washed up...oyster shells by the pound, pearly, purple mussel shells, claws from crabs, bits of horseshoe crab shell, and all kinds of fabulous sea weed.

Anyhow, all that to say that it was a great way to celebrate the baby turning five months old and it will in no way be our last outing of the fall.

I can't wait to go back! I forget how wonderful it is to just wander around bent backed, looking at all the ocean detritus that has rolled in and watch the boys chase seagulls and drive away with the scent of salt water rubbing off your hands onto the steering wheel.

Yay for living by the sea!

Beach Trust

On my mind today are trust, safety and neighborliness. Most strangers are normal human beings...they're you and me and our friends and relatives. Most people who talk to us or approach us aren't dangerous and are perfectly trustworthy. There are of course the random few who are devious, unreliable or even terrifying. This is reality. That said, it is my opinion that those people are:

A.) very rare
B.) usually very spottable

I'm of the old mindset that says you should smile at strangers, wave to people if they let you cut in traffic and make friendly small talk with the other people in line at the bank. I don't teach my children that they aren't to talk to strangers, I teach them that when the nice grandpa ahead of us in line at the check-out says that he "Likes those red shoes young man!" you should dimple a grin and tell him politely, "Thank you very much! I like your tie!" I think if we just trust the people around us we'll buy goodwill for ourselves, show the love of Christ (He did say that love would be the magic mark of His followers) have more fun waiting in lines and sometimes other people will help us when we need it most.

Reid meets the sea 

 

I still teach my sons of course that they shouldn't take candy apples from strange women with warts on their noses, they shouldn't get into cars with random men with green skin and there is to be no signing up for a lifetime supply of iPod just because a really fast talking young fellow with a big grin suggested such when we were down in Times Square. Don't worry. But, I'm trying to avoid the philosophy of stranger danger and instead preach love for fellow man and that we should know and understand our neighbors...even if they're just our neighbors for an hour in the next booth at a restaurant.

Mostly, this sort of courtesy is warmly received by the public but almost never do I hear similar ideas proposed by other mothers. Moms today...yea people in general are terrified of everyone in the world that they do not know. I think this is such a crying shame. But, I do have to share that I have noticed two things that have given me hope.

1. This woman....and the parenting movement she spawned.
2. Beach Trust

Everybody locks their houses up like crazy and people lock their cars, password their computers and have secret codes for everything under the sun but the one place where people still trust each other? The beach. Have you ever noticed that at the beach people leave all of their belongings sitting there in bags and run off like silly kids to splash in the water?

 Unattended beach goods at the Rhode Island shore this past weekend

They drop their towels on the beach blanket, leave behind the sunglasses they love, glinting on the top of their beach tote and go off for a half hour stroll down the shore, far out of sight of their goods. This is a fabulous thing that always makes me tremendously happy to encounter.

 Our own unattended beach goods!

I've never witnessed a beach robbery although I'm sure once in a blue moon it happens but I have seen perfect strangers haul a strolling families worldly goods up out of the range of the encroaching high tide or seen a woman chasing an absent swimmer's hat down the beach after it blew away. I love to see that. I love to be part of it. I love that something about the beach has allowed us to let go in some real, deep way and love and rely on the people around us.

Not just when the beach population is like this:

But even when it looks like this:

More love man, more love.

Beach Rules

This weekend we took Baby to the beach for the first time. We'd been working hard, logging lots of "Be Quiet! Hold Still!" hours for our poor squirrely boys so we all needed a little beach time. Wow did it feel great to just meander around with our toes in the water! We all needed the break. Welcome to a new season of beach weather!

At some houses a trip to the beach is a big exhausting excursion and sometimes it feels that way to us just because life is busy but, I do everything I can to make them relieving, simple times, even for Mommy and Daddy.

Here's how it works:

• Shoes stay in the car....wear nothing but your swimsuit and/ if you need it a t-shirt
• Shells, and sticks and rocks are the best toys...if I'm feeling really extravagant we bring shovels and pails. I don't feel extravagant very often.

• Build sand castles....out of sand...and rocks and seaweed and shells....that's it.
• Get really wet and sandy, its tradition!
• If you feel artsy, make sand sculpture...my favorite thing to make is pirates with seaweed hair and beards and dark shells for eye-patches

• Go for a long, slow wander down shore (or two...sometimes we can't resist)
• Collect things....my rule is that everybody carries their own loot but, pretty much anything not alive is game for pocketing.

• Look for cool living things to admire (at our beaches we have horseshoe crabs mating right now, lots of seaweed washing up and cormorants and other birds diving for fish as a few examples)
• Eat before romping on the shore because all the crumbs and sticky wash off in the water and sand
• Write your name in the wet-sand with a sea gull feather and watch the waves wash it away
• Skip rocks