April 22, 2020
Our Beach Morning
On Saturday morning the beaches of St Johns County decided to open back for restricted times. No “gathering” though so we couldn’t take the baby shade tent which meant limited time for us due to not wanting baby burned. But we went!
Sunday at sunrise we gathered ourselves, tried to wake the more sluggish members of the family, and trouped to the beach. It was a gorgeous morning with nice steady surf and almost high tide when we arrived (well, arrived, changed Thea into her beach romper, let Lucas go potty, and walked over the ramp). There were dozens of surfers out and several fishermen with their coolers and pole stakes. Normal beach life. Actually, quite crowded for our experience, but then after the hurricanes the beaches are always full! Guess quarantine has the same effect as an extended hurricane on beach gatherings.
Thea was excited about the water today and ran out into ankle-deep water. It was cold enough to stop her. Lucas, though, wanted to go out where the surfers were! He couldn’t talk any of the big girls into going with him, so he would run into a wave, jump and land in a push up position half-floating and laugh heavy belly laughs. Tiny conch, mussels, clams, and assorted bivalve sea creatures were washed up under our feet by the thousands! Baby Thea loved them! She kept wiggling her toes and saying “tickle tickle!” The little critters ticked her toes as they burrowed back into the soft sand.
Lucas and Thea also waved and greeted everyone who passed. Anyone they noticed, they wanted to say hi to. Thea wanted to run to every other child and every dog she saw. One actually stopped to let her toddler greet Thea. Both babies were enthusiastic about seeing each other! It was so cute!
Suddenly, a creature was on a shell on the high tide line where I was looking for shells – and I called Becky (seriously, she did Marine Biology, she knows all sea life) to find out what it was. “Oh my! It’s an anemone!” and she gathered it carefully and rescued it by putting it back in the water. After a few more live anemone discoveries and “oh my!” shrieks by Kimberly and Becky, Thea grabbed a random shell, yelped “oh my!” and raced back to the shallow waves to fling the shell into the water like a frisbee. It’s the thought that counts, right?
It was a short visit as Thea’s tender arms let us know it was time to leave (Each person has a limit that we figure out and we go in when the first “red flag of warning” lets us know we are about to get burnt.) About an hour and a half of rescuing sea life, collecting beautiful shells, watching Jaquline and Lucas build a sandcastle, watching Lucas bellyflop into each oncoming wave, seeing Thea no longer be scared of the crashing waves, and watching the beauty of the morning sun in the length of the spring day.
The beach always refreshes me. I love it. I can breathe! This morning felt like a worship service. Our church has been closed for 4 weeks but being in nature is close – everything, including the little mollusks, the variety and beauty of their shells, the glorious waves, the sweet-salty spray opening up my lungs, all of creation shouts God’s glory!
Each of thousands – maybe tens of thousands – of those tiny creatures were each magnificent in their own individual beauty. Just like us. Each of us are independently unique and individually beautiful in our uniqueness. I glanced in my memory at the surfers on the waves; all different, each individual with the common bond of a passion for the stoke of riding the waves. Each of us beachgoers; all different, each individual with the common bond of our enjoyment of the beautiful beach.
This is the beauty in creation. The exquisite beauty of each small piece. Tiny grains of sand that look like gemstones under the microscope. We are more precious than diamonds – knit together by God.
Thank you for reading!
Type at you next time…
~Nancy Tart
