“One should lie empty, open, choiceless as a beach — waiting for a gift from the sea.” I’ve always loved this quote of Anne Morrow Lindbergh, but while on vacation in Northern California last month, it became more than a metaphor to me.

The last wisps of fog were swirling gently along the beach
when my husband and I left our car and began ascending
the sand dune which blocked the ocean from our sight.

Despite my awkward efforts to mount the soft sand
as it gave way and tipped my foot in unexpected directions,
I was rejoicing in the promise of sunshine on our last vacation day
when I spotted Charlie descending the other side of the dune.

Though I didn’t know his name at the time,
he captivated me instantly as each little step
buried half his leg in the sand until he gave up
and slid merrily the rest of the way on his seat.

By then I had crested the dune, and having found firm sand,
we opened our blue camp chairs where we could watch the tide
with our view unobstructed.

Yet my gaze turned frequently toward Charlie,
whose blonde hair gleamed in the sun as he played joyfully,
without toy or friend, near his mother.

I looked away briefly, and when I looked again,
his mother had lifted him onto her shoulders and walked
to the edge of the outgoing tide, where the two of them,
quiet and motionless, watched the rhythm of the breaking waves.

Finally I joined them, though at some distance away,
and turned my attention fully to the sea before me.

I couldn’t recall the edge of the tide ever looking so white
and spreading along the beach like ruffled lace
or the sparkle on the ocean’s surface fanning out so wide
to the horizon, which looked farther away than it ever had.

Love for the sea poured over me and through me,
a love so vast that it seemed as if the sea loved me back
and as if each wave breaking in front of me
rushed to my feet to tell me so.

When at last I returned to my camp chair, the impulse struck me
to share with Charlie’s mother the photo I had snapped earlier.
I grabbed my phone and strode quickly to
where she still stood with Charlie on her shoulders.

“I just have to tell you,” I blurted, “how much I’ve enjoyed
watching your little boy play.” She smiled,
and taking him down into her arms where he faced me,
she replied, “This is Charlie.”
“Hi Charlie. You’re very special,” I told him.
Still facing me, he smiled broadly,
and his eyes sparkled like the ocean that afternoon.

“I hope you don’t mind my taking your picture,”
I told his mother as I showed her the image
of her and Charlie at the ocean’s edge.
She smiled once more and asked,
“Could you send it to me?”

With names exchanged and the picture sent,
the day seemed complete, and my husband,
who had sat reading and glancing up from time to time,
agreed he was ready for what the day would bring next.

After we had folded our matching camp chairs
and stuffed them into their long, matching blue bags,
he strode ahead of me to open the car to the cool sea air.

I slowly made my way up the dune where I had first seen Charlie,
and as I approached the top, I spied a solitary piece of sea glass,
wide as my thumb and half as long, on the very crest of the dune.

I picked it up and held it out toward the sun, where it appeared
translucent aquamarine and seemed to contain tiny bubbles
that sparkled, as if it had kept some of the sea with it.

Not in a lifetime of ocean outings and inevitable beachcombing
had I ever seen a piece of beach glass in anyone’s hand,
but now I held this one, perfectly smooth and gently bowed,
the ocean’s work of decades.

I had been thinking as I climbed the dune
that the world would think me mad if it heard
of the love I had shared with the sea …
that my friends might wonder what had made me high …
but now, here in my hand, lay proof that
the highly improbable is not impossible,
and my own doubts, if I had any, evaporated.