remembrance | white sands

Summers and holidays were spent with my grandmother, "The Flower Lady" at White Sands in Old Lyme.  My siblings and cousins would tie string to a clothespin and fish for mussels on the jetties.  We would fill buckets with green crabs and walk to the bait shop where we would cash in our harvest and then walk to Hallmark Ice Cream as the reward for a sweet treat.  Hours and days were spent combing the beach all the way to Griswold Point for buttercups that I would collect and give to my grandmother.  If we were lucky, we might find some beach glass.  Once my folks moved out of state in 1999, most of my Christmas and Easter visits were to the shore to visit my grandmother and celebrate her April birthday.  I've always had a close bond to my grandmother and since her passing, my soul yearns to comb the beach in winter and April just to be closer to her.  I was intoxicated as soon as my senses absorbed the fresh salt air and scent of soft rain and the familiar call of the gulls. 

Over the years, I have seen the coast line erode and the ocean edge closer to the beautiful, historic homes on Griswold Point.  Where once were high cliffs and sand dunes is now flattened and sparsely littered with trash.  We came across a few dead gulls, something I haven't seen before and it made me wonder how this gull died.  Was it from poisoning or just his time in the cycle of life?  What we throw on the ground in a suburb can lead it's way to the ocean.  Our waterways are the veins to the heart, our ocean.   Waste travels through streams and rivers and eventually into the ocean where aquatic life consume our waste.  A sense of melancholy rushed over me like a tidal wave.  I only hope this beautiful land will be here for generations to come and for all to enjoy.