All year long, my parent saved in order to have a 2 week family vacation at the beach.  We certainly weren’t rich so I am sure my parents gave up many things in order to afford this luxury.  Most of my childhood summer memories are from the beach – hours of playing in the sand with my sister while the tide rolled out or in.  This past weekend we took my grandson, Cayden, to the beach.

As I grew up spending summers in the sand, I didn’t realize you had to teach a child how to play in it.  For Easter, we had bought him brightly colored sand toys (a tradition from my Mom) and we brought them all to the beach on Sunday.  We settled down to watch him play – he had no idea where to begin.  JeanPaul taught him to make sand stars and how to shovel sand.  I taught him how to bury my feet in mounds of wet sand.

He’s all set, now.  He’ll always know how to play in the sand at the beach.  As he sat next to me, the waves slowly crept up with the incoming tide.  Each time a wave got closer to us, he would look up and shout, “Wow!” then laugh and return to his sand project.  I never realized what a gift my parents had given us – those 2 weeks every year at the beach.  I always appreciated the memories and as a adult, when life got too much, I ran away to the beach and now, watching Cayden play in the sand, remembering the hours my sister, Nancy, and I spent playing in the sand, I was a bit overwhelmed by the preciousness of that gift.   I looked at the little boy beside me and imagined the man he will someday become.  And, the children he will someday bring to the beach and teach to play in the sand.   I hope he remembers his time in the sand with as much joy and appreciation as I do.