Cannon Beach

"If you look closely, you can see them."

My father gazed upon the sea. He clasped his hand tightly and then revealed a seashell in his palm.

"They've traveled all this way. Each day, they get closer. They breathe with the waves until they find us... until they make it to the beach."

The August breeze traveled across the Pacific and leapt over and around the rock fortresses of Cannon Beach. These pillars stood as tall as mountains, connecting the ocean sands to the heavens. The waves passed around them and rushed toward our toes. The waters felt colder than ice. Each passing wave flashed through us like lightning, connecting us to everything.

I'd look up at him and laugh when we felt that jolt. He was unphased by it all. He never looked at me, but he stared at the ocean for hours as if he were waiting for someone to come up over that horizon. Perhaps, a voice spoke to him from the other side. Or maybe it was just a feeling that connected him to something he could not see or touch - something he desperately wanted to know.

As a child, I could feel it. There was something there. A love that bound us. A connection to everything, to each other.

That summer was brutal. My mother had passed. She lost a difficult battle with cancer. My sister, years before, to a rare blood disease that kept her in constant medical care and constraints. It was just my Dad and me on that beach. We were lost, yet his gaze fixated on something - a hope that rested in his hands, extending beyond the waves, sand, and sea.

The sun rose, and his face caught the light like a flower. Unbreaking, he watched it rise. His lip quivered. His eyes sparkled with tears. For a second, I thought he had heard a voice, a whisper in the wind.

Perhaps, my mother's laugh? My father was a solemn fellow, and she'd love to get a rouse out of him. She'd try to open his shell just a little. Stoic in all things, the man took everything as a serious matter. But my mother kept him grounded and helped him see that the family fortune would not provide happiness. Instead, that being, feeling, and learning was all we needed to come alive.

Perhaps, my sister's melody? She'd sing in the shower, the kitchen, on the way to school. Her dream was to perform on Broadway. To share with the world her love of music. With each song, we'd feel her joy. We'd feel her hope. We'd feel her dreams growing by the day, as large as that rock on the ocean.

To look upon those lost dreams and see she was not there, yet this rock never crumbled, broke my heart. Some days, when the wind and tide were low, I could hear a voice. As if she was there, sitting on top, singing loudly, so loud we could all hear the whispers of her song.

Breaths.

A rush of wind broke the sound. The giant rock would push the waters toward me every year, and I would listen. Listen as my father did until the waters returned to the sea. Then the rising sun would reveal a glowing beach, a mirror that revealed the heavens, submerged me into clarion where all could be heard and seen.

I looked down, staring at my face. My old, withered face. Wrinkled by the plague of time, the torment of mastering my fate. Reaching this point, I realize there is no control I can gain, no destiny I can summon. I can only adapt. This old man had suffered and battled the world only to discover that he was a grain of sand on the seashore. A voice in the wind.

Like a seashell, to become beautiful, something loved by others and appreciated universally, I had to allow the waves to push me. To lead me. To be who I am, yet go where I am destined. Here on this seashore, searching for seashells. My wife, our kids, and grandkids are at home, yet at this moment, I am not alone.

I could see a seashell buried beneath the sand, underneath the reflection of my face. I reached through it all, pulled the seashell above the surface, and cleaned it off. It was perfect in its imperfection. White with black tarnishes. Etchings formed by the waves. It felt smooth yet rugged, as if it had traveled through currents extending far past this ocean. An entire life— a journey as painful and joyous as any person walking above the sea.

My father handed me one just like it. That August day, when we watched the waves at Cannon Beach. He spoke of our family's fortune. Our wealth had been lost to the relentless pursuits to save my mother and sister. The experimental treatments, the false hope, the defiance of the fate that had been given. He told me he'd do it again if he had to. Spend it all to save them. To give them a chance to make it to the beach.

But like all seashells, everyone must find a resting place somewhere. Some are fortunate enough to make it ashore and be celebrated, stared at in awe. While others don't make it, they are lost in the ocean to remain there for the benefit of it - for the ones still in it. The ones that still need it.

As I gazed upon this seashell, I understood. They did not leave us behind. They were there with us, traveling through the current. The chaos. Their presence was what we needed, what stayed with us until the very end. So we can make it to the beach, where we can rest and enjoy the sun.

Lightning peeled across the sky. Thunder pounded against the ocean and barrelled toward me with another rush of wind. I stumbled up, my joints aching, my eyes straining. In seconds, the clouds bloomed. They grew darker as lightning sparked roots of fire in the sky.

Tourists and travelers scattered from the beach. In droves, they fled from Haystack Rock as if it were a giant groaning in hunger. The wind grew into a glorious gale that raised both water and sand. I couldn't run as my knees had become too weak, too old to outrun the coming storm.

I rested. I watched the storm move toward the beach. I reveled in the blue fire that breathed among the darkness. I did not feel fear. I did not seek escape. Instead, I saw the beauty in it. The beautiful chaos. The way of the world. How the ocean's waves are as the lightning in the sky.

Light flashed. Fire struck the water. Seconds passed, and then the thunder. With each flash, the seconds grew less and less. Time slowed. My senses grew. The ocean became more vivid, the surface blue like sapphire, the waves green like emerald, the sea foam white like snow. Salty air poured into my nostrils, and I saw my father standing beside me. He was staring at me. My skin prickled and grew cold, then warmth filled me as the hairs on my arm rose.

A flash.

Love and pain in one embrace.

Holding the seashell, I look up and see them. I see my mother. I see my sister. My father. My wife. Our children. I stand above the waters and see what all it was. What it will be. Free of the chaos, yet formed by it. We had made it across the ocean. We made it to the beach.