The Inner Life of Someone’s Mother – Tales from the Archives

We moved from the north woods of Wisconsin to Florida – a shock actually. The realtor put us in an apartment on the beach while we looked for a home. It was late fall, early winter. Instead of tramping across wind-swept snow drifts the children and I were tramping across wind-swept white sand. The visible similarity was striking even while the contrast was unmistakable.  We went to the ocean nearly every day to wander, to marvel at our new surroundings and to look for shells.

Looking for shells on a beach full of shells is an art. I compare it to doing a jigsaw puzzle. You must school  your eyes to detect a certain shape, a certain color amidst countless shapes and colors. I didn’t want lots of shells since there was no challenge to that (and soon no place to put them all). I wanted to find one special shell each trip, a scallop as near perfect as possible, with maybe a bit of color. At least one. And soon it was a ritual and a way of entering into our new life.

It is thirty years later. I still look for scallops.