Beachwalking 10/22/11

• The water feels warmer than the air but the young chick in the bikini asks, "why is the water freezing?"
• Found the perfect shell and had to pick it up even though I told myself no.  A tiny pearly coral cup of a shell, something a fairy would drink from.
• White heron cranes her long slender neck sideways to see her fish dinner before she strikes.  Good reminder to look at things from a different perspective.
• Wedding party hits the beach for pictures.  Bride holding up her long ivory dress out of the sand, shows off her expensive pedi.  Groom in starched white shirt, khakis, flip flops, is her perfect photographic match.  Ladies in high heels and stockings pluck their way through the deep squishy sand, try to look dignified but it ain't working.  This is the beach, Ladies.  Kick those heels off.
• Pass a couple with hard, sour faces.  The sand between their toes, the sun on their faces -- what could they be unhappy about?  Unless they are leaving today.
• Walking at the Hilton Resort near North Myrtle, mounds of tiny shells everywhere that I don't see farther south.  I tread lightly on the shell graveyards so as not to crush Mother Ocean's delicate gifts.  Others clomp over the shells with a crunch, like they are slogging through deep snow.  The difference between a beach person and a non-beach person.