My spirit was hungry... so I fed it...

After work today I KNEW I needed to go to the beach... I wanted to go and walk on the sand, smell the salty air, and let go of some of the stress I have been carrying... I remembered to bring my camera and there was lots to pohotograph. The beach was interesting today.. parts of the beach were covered with these huge clams... parts were covered with small pieces of driftwood...parts covered with seaweed.. it was an interesting journey. The clams were everywhere! I have been to that beach often and have seen the huge clamshells... and have found a couple of the living clams that squirted me for disturbing them... but nothing like today. There were thousands of clams, big clams...almost as big as my feet... which is saying something! I also found a lot of sand dollars... live ones... The live ones are purply or reddish and when you flip them over they have these little spiny spiky things on them, almost like a sea urchin would...and they move... the texture feels pretty cool actually. I saw three starfish, only one of which was alive... and there were seagulls... I don't mean a few seagulls... a ton of them... they were feasting on all the clams and other shellfish... they were picking up these giant clams in their mouths, flew high above the beach, dropped them to break their shells, and ate... it was crazy to watch... crazy... people on the beach didn't know what to do ... like the others on the beach, I wondered how to save the clams... I saw people carrying clams to the water, I carried sand dollars to the water... why were they out of the water to begin with? It made me wonder about out environment... or maybe it was related to the crazy storm we had last week... I don't know, but it was unusual...

My entire walk was about 5.5 miles... and I was worried if my breathing could handle it because I have been dealing with bronchitis like symptoms, but my breathing was fine... however I am a bit concerned... my right knee (not the one I had surgery on...) really bothered me... I am supposed to walk 7 miles Sunday and if it does the same thing again, I will go to the doctor. I am hoping that it bothered me because the beach is uneven and it is hard to walk in the sand... we'll see... The beach did help me let go of some stress, though it's also a place to think... and because I was enjoying looking at all that was on the beach and taking over 200 pictures... I was out there for about 3 hours... so there was lots of time to think and reflect...but I needed the beach today... my spirit needed it... I invited a friend to come with me, but she was unable to join me... I am actually glad it worked out that way... so that I could be alone with my thoughts and stop as I wanted to stop...

I think one of the things I like about the beach... is that it erases signs that anyone was there... the waves delete the footprints that were made... so every wave means a clean slate... it's like when you want to make a snow angel, and you try to find the perfect, untouched, patch of snow to make the snow angel.... the beach creates those blank patches constantly... which is beautiful... but also sad... how quickly our impressions are forgotten... how quickly there is no proof we were ever there... how insignificant our footprints can be...

I also thought about how sometimes I allow things in my life to get so hectic, that I allow parts of myself to be washed away or worn down... and how easily it happens... because sometiems it's too hard to keep making those footprints...too hard to keep up with the waves... sometimes I should move further back from the waves...where my footprints will remain until the next high tide... but there is something about the waves that draws me to them...