It should come as no surprise that we all are buried up to
our necks in sand this time of year - and are blissfully visiting friends, family
and all of rabbit’s relations in Ogunquit, Maine.
Having only made brief day trips to the ocean since they
were born, its part anthropological experiment to watch day in and out, tide in
and out, their unmitigated shoreline access.
So far we’ve been reminded that Sophia is an artists through
and through – the beach gives her the excuse of having a limitless (and
self-cleaning) canvas. Indeed, she is up to the task of answering the artistic
call by creating from sunup to down. Henry finds the challenge of such a vast
construction site quite compelling. I’ve read their copy of National
Geographic’s Sand so many times that I can
easily win a trivia contest on where each color of sand originates.
They also play this infectious game – Tony traces their
shadows in the sand using the side of a shell with the sun (it doesn’t matter
the time of day) and their shape, they figure out why and how it looks this
way. Occasionally, we add the smile.
Does it look familiar? I was thinking of the Edvard Munch
painting(s) The Scream. I find it quite
inspiring.
I’m not going to lie and tell you I like the beach at
such-and-such a time. I like it all the time. In the middle of the day; at high
tide when people are scrambling to move their chairs and umbrellas to dryer
ground; early in the morning when everyone is overturning a rock or a thousand in
a tide pool; in the evening when the more sun-sensitive excitedly tuck in with
a blanket and hot fish dinner in a to-go container that’s so hot and sinful
that the whole beach smells like fried food. We happened to take these shots in
the late afternoon – when Sophia’s canvas was just right, the light forgiving, and
the angst-provoking but essential sunscreen was stored in the beach bag for
another day.
And we found ourselves echoing the phrase slipped underneath
many hotel and short-term residences this time of the year:
Happily filled.
