“Don't wish me happiness I don't expect to be happy all the time... It's gotten beyond that somehow. Wish me courage and strength and a sense of humor. I will need them all.” ― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea

The good news  - there are shells.  The bad news - the red tide makes it impossible to breathe to get to said shells.

It is extremely helpful when one is a beach blogger to be able to go to the beach.  Sure, I could blog about a new recipe I made from Pinterest, my latest find at Goodwill or heaven forbid a table scape (mine are the ones with the matching cool whip salad bowls). We all know you are here for the sand, shells & sharks teeth right?  Well, me too.  The Red Tide algae bloom that has been traveling up and down the SWFL coastline since October 2012 has put a major damper on everyone's beach going.  The 120 mile long floating algae bloom has been causing sneezing, hacking & burning eyes as it meanders back and forth off the Sarasota, Lee & Collier county coastline.  Sadly, it is killing a record number of manatees according to a story by the Associated Press.

My beach  blogging has also been curtailed by an injury called SBS or Shell Bucket Shoulder.  I learned the hard way that carrying a heavy bucket full of shell goodies is not the best thing for an over-50-something shoulder.  It also could have been the digging with my shell shovel into a huge shell pile  but then the injury would be called SSS instead of the before mentioned SBS... whatever it hurts like a mammy jammer.  I got stuck in the Beall's Department Store changing room with my head stuck in the tight shirt I was trying on because I couldn't raise my arm. A traumatized Pookie had to rescue me.  I've also had to pass on my kayaking until I am healed up.  I don't want to be on the wrong end of a sea tow call because I could only paddle with one arm.

But as all of us in Blogdom know -  blogger friends are the best friends and recently I received a package in the mail that contained a special copy of my  all-time favorite book "Gift From the Sea" by Anne Morrow Lindbergh.  Last month the author's daughter Reeve was on Sanibel at the Bookshop for a book signing.  A blogger friend who was there to get his own copy signed thoughtfully had a copy signed for me as a gift.

“...I want first of all - in fact, as an end to these other desires - to be at peace with myself. I want a singleness of eye, a purity of intention, a central core to my life that will enable me to carry out these obligations and activities as well as I can. I want, in fact - to borrow from the language of the saints -to live 'in grace' as much of the time as possible. I am not using this term in a strictly theological sense. By grace I mean an inner harmony, essentially spiritual, which can be translated into outward harmony. I am seeking perhaps what Socrates asked for in the prayer from the Phaedrus when he said, "May the outward and the inward man be at one".  I would like to achieve a state of inner spiritual grace from which I could function and give as I was meant to in the eye of God.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh p.17-18 GFTS

First published in 1955 GFTS has sold over 3 million copies in 45 different languages.

A gift from the heart from a person who "gets" GFTS.

So regardless of red tide or frozen shoulder - I am happily living in that state of grace. If you have never read "Gift From the Sea" I highly recommend it. My favorite chapter is "Channeled Whelk".  Just as the waves,wind and the tidal rhythms at the beach calm us and enable us to take a deeper breath, this little timeless book accomplishes the same thing for me every time I read it.