Walking by the sea will clear your mind. How can it not? There is nothing else to see but a clear blue line on the horizon and a wide blue sky above.

That's if you're looking up, of course, and feeling optimistic.



But my head hung and drooped as I walked along, and what I saw was beauty in death.

"Why are you photographing dead fish, mom?"



Perhaps it was because I have felt like them: half-eaten, rotting on the shore among objects more beautiful than I. Shells, textured sands, soft wood worn by the rolling of the tide.

The day comes when each of us must swim alone in life, lie alone, die alone.

How will the sandy picture of my life look when I'm gone? What will be seen when others stumble upon my memory?



I tucked the camera away and sat back down on my beach chair, half staring out toward the west, half watching the children frolic here and there.

A sigh.

And then I picked up my needles once again, and began to knit mindfulness back into my world; for what you give away in love is the flowing seaweed that adorns the picture of your life.