At The Beach

Our family is in love with the ocean. John and I have visited the beach once a year almost every year of our 20 year marriage, including on our honeymoon. No matter where we live, we’re drawn back there year after year after year. He likes to go rock-picking, and I usually bring a book, imagining I will get in some reading. More often than not, what I really do is a lot of family-watching and photography.

This year it is my baby who amazed me first. Our last trip to the beach was in the fall, half a year ago. Half a year ago, she couldn’t even crawl. Now she’s toddling sure-footedly over the rocky ground, collecting rocks–the bigger the better–and doing her darndest to keep up with the big kids. My baby. Looking at her, my heart gives a bittersweet twinge and I have to scoop her up. Oh, they grow so fast.

 

I see next my 14 year old son, walking tall next to his dad. When did that happen? When did that boy get so tall, shoulders almost even with his dad’s? There goes my heart, lurching around again with that mix of sorrow and delight. Oh, they grow…so…fast.

 

And of course there’s my 18 year old. On the brink of independence. Planning for college. Imagining dorm life and college classes and jobs in her future.

An air of distraction about her as if she’s squinting into the misty future, already beginning to leave. But at this very moment she’s still blessedly here in the midst of us. I swear it was only a dozen or so heartbeats ago that she was first laid in my arms.

And the rest of my precious ones. My daughter, on the brink of 16. My son, one short year from his teens.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My little guys, second-graders, still blessedly ensconced in the heart of childhood.

 

 

 

 

 

My 3 year old, who wants so much to be big. They’re all growing up on me, ready or not.

I’ve got to hug more, talk less, listen more, race less, laugh more. And of course keep snapping photos like these moments will never happen again.