The Beach Trees

I know what it is to hope and pray so hard that you're sure God will answer your prayer just so you'll stop asking.

The answers we seek aren't always the answers we want, are they? But knowing the truth is what helps us sleep at night.

it wasn't the mountain ahead that wears you out, but the grain of sand in your shoe

But I think sometimes a person has to be forced underwater to see if they're going to drown or swim.

when you lose your sails, row.

Sometimes I guess you need to lose everything before you realize what's really important.

You ain’t dead yet, so you ain’t done.

The word that came to me now was "defiant." Because a person had to be defiant to be able to stand amid the wreckage of her life and instead of shaking a fist, pick up a hammer.

Death and loss, they plague you. So do memories. Like the Mississippi's incessant slap against the levees, they creep up with deceptive sweetness before grabbing your heart and pulling it under.

When everything you're about to see is too much, look up and see that the sky is clear and know that everything is going to be all right.

I noticed again the bruised oaks nearby, and their gallant attempts to flourish as if their scars didn't exist. "Why did some of the oaks die and some survive?" Aimee gave me an elegant one-shoulder shrug. "Why do some people stay after a hurricane and why do some never come back?" She looked at me, her eyes measuring. "Why do some people continue to search for the missing, and others give up? I don't know. But I think sometimes a person has to be forced underwater to see if they're going to drown or swim.

I stared back at him, trying to think of a way to explain how I'd eradicated the word "want" from my vocabulary long ago and replaced it with "need." It made life so much easier that way, blowing away all the unnecessary and distracting clutter from a life of purpose, much like I imagined a storm sweeping away anything not strong enough to withstand the struggle.

I looked around the garden, the sun feeling warm on my back. "So why are you here? I would think you'd want to be as far away from a hurricane as possible." She looked at me as if I'd just suggested streaking down the beach. It took her a moment to answer. "Because this is home." She wanted to see if the words registered with me, but I just looked back at her, not understanding at all. After a deep breath, she looked up at a tall oak tree beyond the garden, its leaves still green against the early October sky, the limbs now thick with foliage. "Because the water recedes, and the sun comes out, and the trees grow back. Because" -she spread her hands, indicated the garden and the trees and, I imagined, the entire peninsula of Biloxi- "because we've learned that great tragedy gives us opportunities for great kindness. It's like a needed reminder that the human spirit is alive and well despite all evidence to the contrary." She lowered her hands to her sides. "I figured I wasn't dead, so I must not be done

We've learned that great tragedy gives us opportunities for great kindness. It's like a needed reminder that the human spirit is alive and well despite all evidence to the contrary.

Me? Rebuild" I shook my head."First off, I don't know anything about construction or reconstruction. And second, have you been down there? Have you seen it? So many people haven't moved back or rebuilt, and I totally get it. Why invest all that time and money when each hurricane season brings a new threat?" Aimee regarded me with a steady blue gaze. "Why build skyscrapers in San Francisco that might be knocked down by an earthquake? Or why build farms in Kansas and Oklahoma that might get blown away by a tornado?" She snorted, and it seemed so uncharacteristic for the elegant old woman that I almost laughed. "Where did they want us to go, anyway? I figure if we're still breathing, then we're meant to keep going. So we rebuild. We start over. It's just what we do.

We all need something to soften the sharp edges. To give us balance. Otherwise, I think we'd find ourselves stumbling around in the dark like lost souls.

In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost. —DANTE ALIGHIERI

However long the night, the dawn will break. —AFRICAN PROVERB

The lowest ebb is the turn of the tide. —HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW

But we had left our childhood behind, and the burdens of growing up had found us. There was no turning back.

Live so that you tempt not the sea relentless Neither press too close on the shore forbidding . . . Thus in stormy days be of heart courageous And when waves are calm, and the danger over, Wise man, trim your sails when a gale too prosp’rous Swells out the canvas. —HORACE

I continued collecting things after my mother’s death not just because they reminded me of her, but because they were something permanent in a transitory life filled with temporary possessions that held no meaning.

When you lose your sails, row. —ROMAN PROVERB

it wasn’t the mountain ahead that wears you out, but the grain of sand in your shoe.

Death and loss, they plague you.

Survival is like a stone wall, and kindness is a door.