Trash Talk

Like many, I have been doing a bit of a juggling act these last few weeks.  Working on the development of my web-shop, taking care of 'les enfants' and unsuccessfully ignoring the sweet call of Spring...which is a good thing, in fact it's all good....most of the time.

Yesterday, Wednesday...."Web-less Wednesday".... I scheduled in a jog to start the day.  This time, much to my surprise and thrill, my 'tween' oldest garcon wanted to join moi!   The idea was amusing  ... he is at an interesting age and I am very sure, on the brink of the stage of time that hanging with Mommy will soon be well, kinda un-cool.  So I need to cherish these occasions, when my sweet eldest elects on his own to do an activity with me, even if it is giving up my most cherished part of the day, my sweet solitude and early morning body and brain workout during sacred 'me-time-beach-jog'.

So we set off, just before 10am...there is no school on Wednesdays for les enfants in France. The other 4 days of school each week are almost 9 hours long, so Wednesdays are a catch-up day...a yet another sleep-in day for the pre-teen guy, so we got a later start.

I had warned him that I wear my ear-buds and listen to tunes for the jog--it keeps my mind calm, sets the pace and is the only time I have only ONE noise happening in my ears and head all day long.  But only a few paces from the house I realized this was going to be impossible....because as usual,  my escort was talking non-stop and I decided to make an effort to listen even if was all about the latest, greatest game or download.....

I am always a little 'high' when I am on the beach.  I love the smell of the salty air, the breeze, the sand underfoot....we chose our direction and set out.  But a few strides later we came to a dead halt.  Never in the 9 months of living down the road from this beach ... "our" beach ... had I ever seen so much TRASH.  It was low-low tide and everywhere .....  everywhere .... you looked there was trash.

I can only think that the tides are changing right now and holidays are in full Spring Break swing, (which means the Parisians and tourists are in town) and hence the incredible increase in post-picnic debris....otherwise it could only be that a huge trash barge crashed and sunk just off the coast and all of the remnants of it's cargo has come afloat and landed on Normandy beaches.....

In any case, it was disturbing and I have contemplated sending the children, backed with a large bribe of 5-10 euros, and armed with super-size Hefty bags to begin to collect it, before it washes out and back again and out and back again ... and back again, in between gagging, choking and killing precious sea life in it's wake.

 I moved a huge bundle of styro-foam up onto land so it wouldn't go out again at high tide.  I will go back and fetch it later on.  On the return home, my sweet eldest fell behind, and took a rest, and fell more behind and I returned home with about a 20 minute lead.

Not the idealic start of the day I had hoped for.  But a true reminder of the need to take care of and take time for the things that are precious to us.  I wish more people would ... .

A bientot, mes amis.