Sand and Samples
My favorite local beach goes by the name "Warm Waters." If you've ever been to any Southern California beach, you know how funny that name is. Even on the doggiest dog days of August, the water doesn't tip seventy degrees. But this beach sits between the two jetties of the seaside power plant, and the hot steam pumped into the ocean creates a tiny pocket of surf several degrees warmer than the surrounding area.
Saturday afternoon I plunked my Avon sample bag on a Star Wars beach towel and chased 7 and 9 into the waves. My teenaged son, 16-going-on-17, took his longboard and wetsuit and walked far enough away from us to look independent and alone. I watched him rub wax into his board and pull the long zipper of his black suit up his back. He's a good surfer, a better dancer, and one of the bravest people I know. Last year he told his friends at school that he was gay, and two days later he told me. This may be California, but it's a conservative town, and he takes a lot of lumps at school. He never complains.
I spread out on my towel, belly to the ground, and propped up on elbows, Avon brochure in hands. The beach is always crowded on a holiday weekend, and I thought maybe people would notice my reading material and ask if I sold Avon. I stuck a Sun Sport sunscreen spray in the sand at a provocative angle, an Avon lighthouse. I blew up the Sun Sport inflatable beach ball and tossed it to the kids. Half an hour later no one said a peep, and I grew tired of staring at the nail polish and body spa products and stuck the book in my bag.
7 and 9 dragged sticks in the sand, building a network of roads around their sand castle. They collected tiny irridescent clam shells and pieces of shiny tan kelp, and made a gas station, amusment park, and petting zoo. I only knew what these last bits were because they kept a running dialogue going as they shoveled and patted and watered. One piece of driftwood was a dinosaur, a Raptor, and he stomped toward the castle, ready to attack. I closed my eyes.
The sun and the whisper of waves and murmur of a hundred families lulled me to sleep, the sort of rest a mom at the beach allows, one ear and telepathic eye on patrol, ready to sound the trumpet should a child be in danger. I think I rested an hour, maybe a little longer, and I opened my eyes to survey the continued castle creation.
What a sight! The castle and moat doubled in size, and an airport addition was underway, both boys busy scultping jet fighters from pebbles and wet sand. And all around the village were small white square flags, fifty of them, stiff and unyielding in the ocean breeze, a small piece of driftwood inserted into each one. Fifty Avon sample flags, declaring this village a bastion of beauty and cleanliness. My sample bag lay on its side, empty and wet and grainy.
11:04:19 AM 
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