The boy had to be at work at 7:30 am. Add travel time and there would be no deer to be seen. THAT and the forecast last night said thunderstorms. Add that I didn’t sleep. I wasn’t going to see Robert today. I made my online shopping list in the wee hours. I dropped him off at work, phoned the husband and said I was going shopping. I am such a liar! Not sure when I changed my mind, but honestly I wasn’t committed to getting out of the car until I parked.

In the short distance from boardwalk to water, I was already musing that men who make their living on the water must feel like polygamists. It is different everyday, this line I walk. Today there was an abundance of shells as far as I could see. Usually, it is sheer force of will that propels me forward, counting steps or lifeguard chairs. I’m here for at least two reasons. There is patch of skin on each leg that has been compromised which means that those who bother to look probably think I have been burned. My father used to say the salt was healing. Since I noticed a difference the first day I kept my date with the ocean, I believe him. The second reason is to do the things I want to do again--- to do the things I want to DO--- I must improve my balance and stamina.

THAT and the fact that I feel like if I fall now I will never be able to get up; from floor, from ground, from any horizontal, from sorrow. I think again of my overwhelming question: was Chris’ death the tipping point for all grief? I kick off my periwinkle crocs and note a lovely bleached oyster shell and a feather that I make a mental note about. I will be bringing them home. Walking toward and then looking out into the blue while my legs get their ointment, for the first time in all these visits I am weeping. I count the times the water laps past my knees and when I think its enough, I sigh and start to walk east, now mostly out of the water because the shells have me mesmerized . I bend to begin the filling of pockets and think these shells will propel me through the year the way they propel me down the beach. I will put them in a jar and bring them to school and put them on my desk. I will call Christy to look at them when we are feeling demoralized and destroyed; to remind us that summer will come again. I brought an old ball jar like this to Tennessee when I went to school, complete with sand and water collected at Jones Beach.

There’s a lovely scallop shell grabbing my attention, but when I bend to pick it up the translucent beauty next to it is unmistakably a dragonfly’s wing, I peel it away from the sand carefully and attempt to lay it on the back of my hand to look at it more closely. Of course, instead it does what it was meant to do; a breeze catches it and carries it away. Two more steps and an audible “Oh my God” passes my lips. Foot-long from nose to tip of tail is a stingray, white belly exposed. I take a large clamshell to flip it over. Coral colored and spotted, this is nothing like the one I saw in Monterey, but that was alive, grown and behind glass. As captivating as this is, I am urged on. At some point, I wonder if my shoes have been carried away, and turning to scan, their color doesn’t help. I guess it is time to head back. Maybe I will find them; maybe the oyster shell and feather are also gone.

What thoughts walked with me then? I cannot say. I found my shoes, slipped into them and found the white shell I planned to pocket. When I reached for the feather, I saw a tiny one near it and took it as well . I thought the longer one represented everything that had already been accomplished; the small one what was just beginning… but then I turned it over in my mind. The small one was the past; the longer one how far there is still to go and how much there is left to do. I thought of how many times I had said “Not yet” to Chris and how I would buoy him up about the things that were still possible. Not once did I say “Not yet because it will kill me.” Maybe I should have. When I reach for the metal rail of the boardwalk., I step up and bend my head down at the same time, letting my forearm hide my face. I think again about how falling now feels like never getting up again. I walk to my car and empty my pocketful of shells into the molded plastic space meant for coffee. I stick the feathers in next to them and drive home, singing.