Billions of seashells, seashells for me.

Sorry for the hiatus, I was on an one-week mental and physical vacation on the beaches of Florida over the holidays. I needed to get away from it all, clear my head, set my sleep schedule back on track, breathe fresher air, and start anew.

It was almost like I wanted to start my life over again. It was like I wanted to purge away all my sins, stories, histories in time for 2006. It was almost like I wanted to wake up one morning with completely amnesia, with the only thing left to do is stretching my arms to a new ray of the morning sun. Don't get me wrong -- I love my life. I wouldn't change it for the world. But don't you ever feel like things would be a lot better if you were given a chance to start afresh?

Every other day of vacation, I took a long jog along the beach. With my head carried high as I ran, I inhaled the refreshing ocean air and looked at the gentle waves rolling over the shoreline, the flocks of seagulls and other funny little sea birds, and the billions of shells scattered across the glistening white sands.

These shells were alive once. The early bird gets the worm, and as the seagulls waddled around with full satiated bellies, they left behind billions of these empty shells-- purple, black, striped, and plain. There were large ones and small, cracked, ridged, scarred, spiraled, bumpy, and perfectly exemplary ones.

I would stop to pick up a 'perfect one' and continued running. Better ones that caught my eye, I would pick those up. Soon I realized I couldn't run with a handfull of seashells, so I'd toss all but one out into the ocean. Kerplunk, splash.

Eventually I let the last one go.

I got tired, so I decided to take off my shirt and lay down in the sand. The way the sun rays caressed my face felt good. I began to study the sand. The sand that sifted through my fingers was so fine and easily flew into the breeze. 'What was white sand made of?' I wondered. I looked closer.

Why, they are just pieces of these seashells! Sure there are tiny white pebbles that are considered to be 'pure white sand' but half of it were mashed up pieces of shells from decades ago. Or perhaps from only yesterday. Instantly, I felt sad. Here, I was laying down on pieces of history-- histories long forgotten, or never cared much about in the first place. Remnants of ocean life. I wanted to hug the sand, but of course, that would have been silly. Instead, I closed my eyes, let the sun kiss my face, breathed in what the ocean offered to me, and celebrated my own vitality.

I immediately woke up. I ran back and reached for my cell phone.

It was time to phone old friends. I wanted to apologize for throwing the sea shells out in the sea while I was running.