Collect

I am a collector- that is my true nature- as well as a creator.  I love few things better than searching and finding, sorting and naming.  Even when I was small, I knew the names of the dinosaurs and diligently hunted for bones in the gravel pasture road at Headacher.  A bit older, and I collect seashells (not an easy task when living in Pennsylvania) created books with their names, data, carefully drawn pictures- dragging home oyster shells from restaurants, living for the days on the beach in California so I could scrabble among the rocks and the kelp.  Fortunately, my parents indulged me totally in this- waking up at odd hours to take me to the beach so I wouldn't miss the tide~ never saying 'that's to stinky' when I would drag something home.  I collect other things as well- bones and stones and books and folk art and curiosities- they have magic for me- but the shells are special.  I dream about them.

On New Year's Day, I was out playing with the yarden, trimming up the crepe myrtles all full of resolutions.  On my birthday we burnt the ditch and part of the front yard, making way for new growth.  The unintended victims of our ditch burn I found when I was cleaning the ditches, the small pile of shells gathered in the tea bowl above.  Two different types of ram's horns and another, longer snail- I don't know their names because I haven't studied land snails much- but finding them was like a promise.  A promise that wherever I am, the things I love are to- you just have to look a bit harder, in different places, and be willing to find them in different forms.