Sand surfing

Sand- that tiny gritty stuff that runs through your fingers when you close your hand. It is the moments of everyday that we try so hard to keep forever, to remember individually, but they blend together with all the thousands of others. However, cumulatively we pack these memories together and build a house. Or we climb on top of them to gain perspective. They are what boost us up and make us feel like we are on top of the world. And sometimes they are the most important thing in that world.

Over Christmas break my family went to visit some relatives in Texas on their 85 acre cattle ranch. The property is bordered by a little creek that runs through some old cottonwood and red oak trees. There are ponds, prairies, horses, and newborn cattle. We walked around the perimeter and checked it all out and the part that enticed my kids the most was the large sand piles that were created when the pond was dredged out this summer to deepen it during a severe drought. To them they really are mini- mountains and nothing makes one feel more triumphant than climbing a mountain- or putting the last finishing touches on a sand castle.

Michael, Cris and Connor on the sand piles

I think children and striving artists understand the need to "create a place where your imagination can wander. We build this place with the sand of memories; these castles are our memories and inventiveness made tangible. So part of us believes that when the tide starts coming in, we won't really have lost anything, because actually only a symbol of it was there in the sand. Another part of us thinks we'll figure out a way to divert the ocean. This is what separates artists [and children] from ordinary people: the belief, deep in our hearts, that if we build our castles well enough, somehow the ocean won't wash them away. I think this is a wonderful kind of person to be.” -Anne LaMotte from Bird by Bird: Some instructions on Writing and Life