Look for your tide pools…
If you have never come across a tide pool on the beach, you need to go ahead and find videos on YouTube so you can get a grasp of how magical they are. Does not matter how old I get, finding a shallow pool on the beach that is connected to the vast ocean without the waves is magical.
Often times, you find special shells in the shallow. Mostly because waves on cracking down. The sand is soft. The water warmer as its shallow and heating in the sun faster. The ocean adds little bits of water at a time, but in a safe way, making it fun to play around without your guard up.
Tide pools can only happen at precise moments between high and low tides. When beach erosion is at the right spot for dips in the sand. It takes multiple things to go right to enjoy such a space. Some tide pools can stay for an hour or so, but most go away quickly when they are only 6-12 inches deep.
They also look cool.
You stumble on this tiny lake in the middle of a sandy beach and you get to enjoy it while being steps from, what is often, a more dangerous ocean.
We found a tide pool this weekend. Not the first one this summer season, but the first one in this particular beach close to our home. One close enough to where we sit that I could have a chair right next to the tide pool and watch the kids play. That picture on this blog is the tide pool in question. Beautiful right? September is one of the best times at the beach in NY. The water has warmed up all summer. The Carribean blues start to appear. The waves lower between hurricane cycles. And the tides and erosion line up for tide pools.
So much has to go right for a tide pool that when we see one we just have to go play. Within 1.5 hours it was gone. That meant making the most of it while we were there. Building moots and villages next to it, searching the shallows for special shells, sitting in it when we did not want to play… just being in it.
A great lesson. I am sure you can see it as I reflect. You need to find your equivalent of tide pools. What are the things that are so beautiful but take so much alignment to happen. It could be special family dinners or a big promotion. It could be the ability to pickup kids from school and hear about a day, or the opportunity to land a consulting gig. It does not matter the personal or professional what as much as the how it comes about and are you savoring it. Because if you don’t it may not happen again….