Back in the late ’90 Kel took the picture below of our dogs at the beach steps from the condo we rent on vacation. Patch, the white and black border collie, is lying in the puddle; and Data, the black and white border collie, is patiently waiting.
Several of these 19 steps were underwater at high tide. Likewise, the puddle is leftover from high tide. To walk or play on the beach, we consulted tide tables, so we’d know when there was a beach to walk on.
Fast forward to October 2014 where there are 9 steps visible (see picture below of Kel and our border collie, Matty) of the same stairway.
High tide doesn’t get within 100 yards or the stairs or the boulders. Here’s a photo from the top of the steps. Sea grass is growing as well as plants that produce sandspurs, otherwise known as burrs or painfully-sharp-things-that-hurt-when-you-step-on-them-and-make-you-want-to-swear-vividly (That’s a technical term, by the way.). I’ve seen plenty of deer feeding in this area in recent years.
According to the permanent local residents, Hunting Island, which lies just north, is losing sand and it’s depositing here, so it’s nothing like our oceans are disappearing or anything like that. The authorities are devising a strategy to combat the erosion.
In past years, the condo residents, facing much the same situation, imported the boulders to halt the high tide erosion of the Fripp Island beach.
It’s amazing how much has changed naturally in less than two decades. Further north on Fripp Island, a sandbar that was only visible at low tide has become a permanent peninsula, extending the beach more. North of that, a new sandbar, which is quite large, is visible at low tide. Perhaps, in the coming years it will become a permanent peninsula, too.
Heraclitus said, “Change is the only constant in life.” Change is. Nothing we can do can stop it. Naturally, we perceive change as either good or bad–this is the only thing within our control, yet it’s vitally important.
Growing old brings on gray hair and wrinkles, yet knowledge and wisdom tend to accumulate. Children growing up and leaving for college brings sadness, yet it’s a step that must occur for them to grow as an adult. People enter into relationships full of hope and joy. People leave dysfunctional relationships, oftentimes sad. Yet, only then, will these people have the opportunity to find healthy, fulfilling relationships.
In the end, as we experience change, it’s up to each of us to make the best of it.
I’m an author living in northern Virginia with a wife and a cat. In the late ’80s, I worked on the International Space Station project. I recently retired from managing a group of software engineers to focus on writing science fiction and speculative fiction. Learn more.