traveling as we often do on Sundays, looking for places for the children to play, when we found a beautiful, abandoned stretch of beach. The day was glorious. I brought a book, a novel about castles and kings, so that I might sit and read in my “matureness” while the children frolicked like untethered colts. But this time something in their playfulness stirred me to put the book down.
I moved closer to see what they were up to. My eldest daughter was building her own castle close to the water line and calling it the Taj Mahal. She moved giant buckets of sand to build it higher, and I laughed at her vain attempts to get the family dog employed in digging at just the right spot. My youngest daughter asked if I wanted to join her and, like an excited new friend, I quickly agreed. We worked on a piece of monolithic proportion. I likened it to a lost Mayan temple, but she wanted it to be the home of a magical princess called Leah, who hid in the far sand tower and could only be seen by her.
As the sun set, we gave our castles a rest and enjoyed the last hours of a fragrant summer day, until the sudden oncoming tide sent us back to building. My youngest tried to complete the tunnel outside her temple before the ocean struck. But it was too late. The water was upon us and, with dusk approaching, we gave up. The time to leave had arrived. The children moaned and asked to stay a little longer. Their father was firm in his plans to leave until I protested a little, too. So we lingered there on our little stretch of beach and watched the waves roll for a few moments more.
We talked about getting a better contractor for the next family sand mansion and which of the five remaining towers the princess might be hiding in. We whooped and aahed as the ocean waves crept over our Taj Mahal. We marveled at a power much greater than ourselves that moved the tides on this planet and in our lives. I explained that these were the tides that brought Father from faraway England and Mother’s ancestors, full of faith and hope, to this new land long ago.
A few tourists passed, but I no longer worried about my appearance. I imagined the adults looking longingly as they saw my sandy arms and legs. I bet they secretly wished they had a child within them that would help them build pyres to the sun, castles of invisible princesses and sacrifices to the waves. We watched as the whole kingdom was swallowed and returned to the sand, to await the dreams of another builder, another time. My youngest brought home a bucket of sand where the princess was hiding. “She’s going to live under our rosebushes from now on,” she said.
We stopped for ice cream on the way home. The man at the store remarked how young I looked, but it’s what I felt that was so delicious: young again and full of wonder. The next morning, taking my coffee out on our sun deck, I nearly tripped over a tiny pair of sandy shoes. It should have annoyed me, but it didn’t. My bones may have ached, but I was happy. As I watched the sun rise, my husband joined me. “I creak,” I said to him. He shook his head. “No,” he said softly, touching my sunburned nose, “you glow, my little sand queen. You glow.”
Nancy V. Bennett
ZIGGY © ZIGGY AND FRIENDS, INC. Reprinted with permission of UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATE. All rights reserved.
Sea Dog
It was in the busy industrial seaport of Kaohsiung, Taiwan, that Chung Chin-Po, captain of the oil tanker Insiko 1907, received an unexpected gift from a friend: a two-week-old terrier puppy to accompany him on his long voyages. Honored, the captain named the puppy Hok-Get, a Taiwanese word meaning happiness, blessings and good fortune—qualities he hoped the little dog might somehow bestow upon the Insiko and its crew.
It soon seemed that the captain was right. Life at sea could be very lonely, and for the next two years the frisky little dog provided a happy diversion and faithful companionship for the ship’s crew. She scampered about
I moved closer to see what they were up to. My eldest daughter was building her own castle close to the water line and calling it the Taj Mahal. She moved giant buckets of sand to build it higher, and I laughed at her vain attempts to get the family dog employed in digging at just the right spot. My youngest daughter asked if I wanted to join her and, like an excited new friend, I quickly agreed. We worked on a piece of monolithic proportion. I likened it to a lost Mayan temple, but she wanted it to be the home of a magical princess called Leah, who hid in the far sand tower and could only be seen by her.
As the sun set, we gave our castles a rest and enjoyed the last hours of a fragrant summer day, until the sudden oncoming tide sent us back to building. My youngest tried to complete the tunnel outside her temple before the ocean struck. But it was too late. The water was upon us and, with dusk approaching, we gave up. The time to leave had arrived. The children moaned and asked to stay a little longer. Their father was firm in his plans to leave until I protested a little, too. So we lingered there on our little stretch of beach and watched the waves roll for a few moments more.
We talked about getting a better contractor for the next family sand mansion and which of the five remaining towers the princess might be hiding in. We whooped and aahed as the ocean waves crept over our Taj Mahal. We marveled at a power much greater than ourselves that moved the tides on this planet and in our lives. I explained that these were the tides that brought Father from faraway England and Mother’s ancestors, full of faith and hope, to this new land long ago.
A few tourists passed, but I no longer worried about my appearance. I imagined the adults looking longingly as they saw my sandy arms and legs. I bet they secretly wished they had a child within them that would help them build pyres to the sun, castles of invisible princesses and sacrifices to the waves. We watched as the whole kingdom was swallowed and returned to the sand, to await the dreams of another builder, another time. My youngest brought home a bucket of sand where the princess was hiding. “She’s going to live under our rosebushes from now on,” she said.
We stopped for ice cream on the way home. The man at the store remarked how young I looked, but it’s what I felt that was so delicious: young again and full of wonder. The next morning, taking my coffee out on our sun deck, I nearly tripped over a tiny pair of sandy shoes. It should have annoyed me, but it didn’t. My bones may have ached, but I was happy. As I watched the sun rise, my husband joined me. “I creak,” I said to him. He shook his head. “No,” he said softly, touching my sunburned nose, “you glow, my little sand queen. You glow.”
Nancy V. Bennett
ZIGGY © ZIGGY AND FRIENDS, INC. Reprinted with permission of UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATE. All rights reserved.
Sea Dog
It was in the busy industrial seaport of Kaohsiung, Taiwan, that Chung Chin-Po, captain of the oil tanker Insiko 1907, received an unexpected gift from a friend: a two-week-old terrier puppy to accompany him on his long voyages. Honored, the captain named the puppy Hok-Get, a Taiwanese word meaning happiness, blessings and good fortune—qualities he hoped the little dog might somehow bestow upon the Insiko and its crew.
It soon seemed that the captain was right. Life at sea could be very lonely, and for the next two years the frisky little dog provided a happy diversion and faithful companionship for the ship’s crew. She scampered about
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