simply good...

i'm not sure when, or how, the affilliation we have for the ocean began - maybe it started on the ship that brought our family from ireland to australia - maybe those many weeks of seafaring slowly allowed for salt air and ocean water to seep into our veins. maybe the connection is tied merely to childhood memories. i don't know?! all i know for sure is that it's there...and it's strong.

growing up in australia meant the ocean and a good beach were never far away. and even if we were distanced from the ocean...like when we moved to the deserts of alice springs...the beach, with it's sticky salt air, third-degree burning sand and the attention-getting sting of a jelly fish wasn't far from our hearts or our holiday plans.

around 1966 or '67 my parents started a tradition of camping at kingston park - a long stretch of family camping sites that sat so close to the coast line of south australia you could still hear the constant roar of the ocean as you dozed off to sleep...planning more of whatever it was you did today to do tomorrow. we had summer friends that we would connect with year after year. there were the summer crushes - the name dino ring a bell anyone...gerry?! there were open air movies. the christian group with it's non-denominational activities for all to enjoy. walks to the kiosk on the beach. the iceman in the mornings. lines for the shower. sunburns and calloused feet. not to mention what seemed like a thousand steps, maybe there were only 100, that led from the top of the hill down to the camp ground, and the reward of stopping for a sausage roll or pastie and a cold can of stonie from the deli when you got to the bottom.

we camped in two big white marquee tents...one for cooking and living, where mum and dad slept. the other for us kids to sleep in. we had lilos, blow up beds, that we would play on in the water during the day and then hope against hope they'd dry out in time for us to sleep on them at night. we stayed so long that by the time we packed up to go home the thick grass under our tents had turned white, a phenomenon that never ceased to amaze me. we went for so many years that we called the caretakers uncle fred and aunt erica. dad would head out to work each day and come "home" to the beach in the evenings. we attended church each sunday at marion ward. we could take whatever clothes we could fit in a brown paper grocery bag.

as a kid life was simple...and it was good.

so good in fact that most of us, if not all of us, have continued with that beach tradition. the location has changed. we're grown and scattered...too big and too vastly spread to attempt to do it all together...but it seems that each of us, which ever hemisphere we might live in, now gathers our own rapidly growing families together eager to spend time and just enjoy the simplicities that life still has to offer. we are grateful for the opportunity to reunite and reconnect. happy for the chance just to sit and visit, to cuddle the newest babies, be amazed at how much the grandkids have grown; feel sad to have missed some of those in between moments, but so pleased to hear all the stories and at times feel like you were actually there. we are happy to eat, and play, and laugh, and stay up too late, caught in conversations that can't wait until the morning because in the morning there will be other things that will need talking about.

thanks mum and dad for such opporunities... for instilling in us all enough sense to appreciate those memories and want them for our own children.

as a grown up i am so thankful for the reminder that life can still be simple.
and that it is oh so good.

distance makes the heart grow fonder. what a crock...

next week we head out for our annual beach trip.

we actually start thinking about the following years trip as we're driving home from the current years trip with the smell of the ocean still in our noses, and the remnants of sand still in our clothes, and our toes, and the many other nooks and crannies that can gather and hold sand and salt water. i love that my kids have inherited my love of the beach and all things "laid back", and that steven, having been born and raised in the deserts of arizona, can appreciate that kind of life style and has willing adopted it as his own. this year tho' i am especially grateful for our family trip.

the past four weeks have been crazy busy. i've been gone at least some part of the week or weekend since the end of may. we had the trek which left liam and caitlin home. a few days after our return i headed to ohio for ariana & dericks nuptuals. then this past weekend i was in smalltown, arizona acting as photographer for my sister-in-laws niece's (uncle's brother's cousins) wedding.

don't get me wrong...the trips have all been wonderful and well worth it. the trek was truely amazing. i wouldn't have missed the opportunity to reconnect with dinah and her family for anything in the world. i even appreciate the lessons learned on this last trip, mainly that i stink at group shots, i suck at flash photography, and i really need to take some classes because i discovered that i really do like photographing people, mostly kids, and with some experience i might actually get over my nerves and self doubting and one day be half way good.

the problem with all these trips is that we have been apart so much as a family...we haven't been able to do them all together. and i have REALLY missed steven and the kids. i mean i call them each day just to touch base, but it's not the same. i miss their faces. i miss their touch, and their kisses. i miss their voices without the ambiance of cellular static. being apart might be easier if i just loved steven and the kids...the problem is that i really, genuinely, like them. i like having them around. i like the jokes we share. i like the laughter. i like wrestling with connor and thinking that i might actually be able to "take him" this time. i like spending time with them even if it's just to cuddle on the couch and watch tv. i especially like it, love it even, when steve gets the giggles and just can't stop, usually over something he has said that he thinks is funny!

and so, at last, finally, and without further ado...next saturday we will pick up the rental van, load the trailer to the hilt with everything from tents to boogie boards to beach umbrella's, and head out in the very wee hours of sunday morning to california...as a family. all together. all at the same time. all blessed to have each other.

of course i am a realist. i don't live completely in a fantasy world - i know full well that i may be rethinking some of this all-togetherness after about six hours in the cramped quarters of a mini-van...but at least i'll be able to gaze fondly upon their bright and shining faces as i'm threatening them within an inch of their very lives and debating whether or not to leave them on the side of the road.