Soggy, beautiful beach

One misty moisty morning, when cloudy was the weather,
I chanced to meet an old man clothed all in leather.
He began to compliment and I began to grin,
With a "How do you do", and a "How do you do", and "How do you do", again.

-Mother Goose

It was a misty moisty morning here on Tuesday, but we were on a mission, two of my children and I. We had to go to the beach to buy a season pass to give as a gift.

I love the beach! No matter the weather, there is something about
being near the water that refreshes and revives.

And a season pass to the beach is a good gift.

So we drove about an hour to the state park, bought the needed pass, and then spent a short 15 minutes relishing the beach in its cold, soggy state. It was beautiful anyway:

Being off-season, the picnic tables were all stacked up, waiting for warmer weather. Bulldozers were busy scooping up great buckets full of sand that had blown across the parking lot and piled up in the driveways. They carried it back onto the beach and dumped it where it belonged. Maintaining a beach takes a lot more work than we realize.

Brother and Sister walked down to the water and back.



The familiar lighthouse stood guard in the gray.


And on the road heading back,
a row of gingerbread up on the bluff looked out over the water...

this is what they see.


And there was this cool old building, painted on the side.


Truthfully, this time of year can be dull and colorless. It's been cold. It's far better than February, but still cool, and the earth seems to be waiting, waiting... for warmth and life to burst forth. The trees are bare, and the ground near our house is still littered with last fall's leaves, crisp and brown and dead. We glean hope from an occasional spot of green grass or bud, but most of the beauty is still only a potential. When warmth comes, things will change.

But for us on this day, running an errand in the cold and mist, it was a good day. There was beauty on the beach. And isn't that how it usually is? There is ugly and there is beauty, and we have to choose to see beauty around us. Sometimes we have to go out of our way to find it. It's worth the effort.

Soon, I hope to post pictures of warmer days!

More joys and thank yous:
108. nursery rhymes, because they are fun and they remind me of my mother and when I was small
109. a trip to the beach on a wet day
110. the way everything looks on a misty day, like we are living in a dream or a story or something