We took our girls to a family reunion in the Outer Banks. From the moment they saw the beach it was next to impossible to pry them away from it. They are part mermaid, I'm sure of it.
The beach was littered with all sorts of shells, including many black scallop shells. I started picking up the black shells. There were so many that I started getting picky, putting down any shell with chip or holes. I wasn't sure what I was going to do with the shells I collected but I was going to have perfect specimens for whatever it was.
As I was collecting my "perfect" scallop shells, E decided she wanted to collect shells, too. She grabbed a sand pail and in about 2 minutes she had it filled. She was very proud of her haul. She had picked up anything—oyster shells, broken shells. She had no plan, no specific preference. I wanted to tell her to leave the dull gray oyster shells on the beach, they filled up the pail much too quickly. I did tell her to slow down and that she might want to concentrate on just the really special ones. She picked up another oyster shell and said, "This one is special." I did not agree but I didn't argue. I just watched her enjoy the collection and went back to gathering perfect black scallop shells.
We brought our pails back to the house and left them on a table on the deck and went inside. During the night some strong winds knocked over our assemblage of shells. I saw the toppled over pails and I figured I'd lost a couple of my pretty black shells. I wasn't particularly concerned with E's shells; half of them were broken when they originally went into the bucket.As I walked over to the table to pick them up I noticed that my pile of black scallop shells looked rather flat and unremarkable. E's various shells were more interesting.
E was right, her shells were special. Even the oyster shells had character. I mixed my black shells with hers and made a temporary little shell collage and gave thanks for a daughter who knows beauty isn't about perfection.
