"I'll bring all my shoes and my glasses with me...so I have them."

We are back after eight days of beach life in Truro, Massachusetts.  My daughters were adorable and precious for most of the trip, Todd deservingly spent a week reading and relaxing, and I spent several days: fielding calls about my mother requiring twelve daily hours of paid companionship because of erratic behavior associated with the end stages of Alzheimer's, and answering demands about the absolute soonest that we can move her to a nursing facility for the next and last stages of care.  I still made time for slow mornings and beachy days with my kids and cocktailed evenings with my sisters and our husbands.  I still ate a lot of handmade ice cream, including the too salty and still delicious salted caramel (with extra nuts). 

And, I am without my prescription sunglasses because on the last day, I was surprised by a sick wave (dude) that tousled me when I thought I was just floating idly along in the gentle swells at Longnook Beach.  Suddenly, I was underwater and backwards and refastening my hair clip.  Then another wave surged and when I stood back up, sputtering, I wondered why everything looked so blurry.  And by then it was too late, because I knew that somewhere, a wicked cool seal was wearing my Oakleys on his way up to Provincetown.

This all happened, of course, in water that was three or four feet deep.