Appreciation

It’s a simple concept.  Just look around and take note.  Yet more often than not, we’re too busy to do just that.  In my case, it’s that I’m too withdrawn into myself because of chronic migraines.  I do have good days though.  It’s important for me to not spend those times waiting for the other shoe to drop.  It’s not healthy to live cradling my head protectively.  Yes, when the pain is there, but no to the times when I’m expecting it to be.

Yesterday I had laid down in order to prevent a migraine from overriding my precious time at the beach with my husband and our married daughter.  That Jana was able to work her schedule and has a marriage in which she and her husband allow the other to go away sometimes with family or friends is truly a gift.  As I lay quietly, I could hear my husband calling to her from outside.  I knew Jana discovered something interesting.  So rather than stay in bed, I got up, put on my coat, and walked down to the fence line overlooking the little ocean cove at our timeshare in Depoe Bay, Oregon.

       We counted twenty four harbor seals

Was I ever glad I had!  Jana pointed down below to the rock outcropping about thirty feet from us.  There they were, twenty four harbor seals laying on rocks.  Some peered up at us with their round button eyes.  Others stretched, yawned and moved.  All of them looked up when we barked down to them or spoke loudly.  They were amazing to watch in their laziness.  These seals looked like overgrown garden slugs. 

My daughter and I observed these creatures for a long time.  We were the only humans out there after a young  couple left.  The tide began slowly creeping in, but then quite suddenly a sneaker wave swept up over part of the rock, pushing exactly half of our seal friends into the ocean.  Jana and I laughed as the ones remaining flopped around on their bellies for a better position.  One seal decided to slide into the water before it got to him first, while another opted to abandon an attempt to hoist himself onto the rock. 

We both checked incoming waves for proper angle and strength, figuring another big wave would sweep the rest of the seals into the drink.  We had one little guy peering up at us from the ocean before we lost track of him.  Eventually the seals outlasted us humans.  Jana and I got cold in the Oregon coast winter weather.  We enjoyed our time out there however.  I was very happy and appreciative to have that time with my daughter and those seals.  You never know what surprises await unless you simply look around.