Sea Glass Extravaganza!

I'm strangely enthralled with finding beautiful things.  It's a combination of the joy of discovery, and the fear of the item never being found.  There's just something about spotting that perfect piece at goodwill, a lost earring on the ground, or a 4 leaf clover among so many 3 leaves.  A few years ago I learned about sea glass, and it struck something inside me.

It's quite poetic; the accidental beauty of sea glass.  Humans dumping their trash into the ocean for years upon years, only for the ocean to patiently roll the hardest parts along the sand and through the waves to produce this beautiful smoothed little gem.  The glass is frosted by the salty sea water, breaking down the outer surface of the glass.

The glass holds pieces of human history, now gone with the advent of plastics.  They are archaeological pieces.  Blues may come from medicine, vapo rub or nivea bottles, reds may come from pre-plastic tail lights, and pastels often come from perfume bottles.



When I started planning my trip to California, this passion for sea glass was certainly in the back of my mind.  Sea glass certainly can be found anywhere, but my understanding is that it is concentrated on English, Japanese, and Californian shores.

So, trying to contain my excitement, I asked the friend I was visiting, "do you know if there's any sea glass near you?  I think it's supposed to be more common out there, and I've always thought it would be cool to find some."

To my surprise, he says, "I think there's a whole beach of it!"  It turns out that Glass Beach in Fort Bragg is 2 and 1/2 hours from Sonoma where he lives, but my very sweet companion was willing to drive me there.  We drove through beautiful redwood forests, quaint towns, and along lovely coastline.

It was more than worth it.  The beach was so unlike the East Coast beaches I'm used to.  Covered in glittering sea glass, with imposing awe inspiring cliffs.  The place was incredibly beautiful.  I collected a few interesting pieces, and we stayed in a lovely bed and breakfast with an ocean view.

If it weren't for my crazy crafting, I don't think I would have visited this incredible spot!

Time & Space

Watercolor U.S. pillow by HLBhomedesigns

I just flew 2,000 miles across the country.  it's incredible how commonplace that occurrence has come to be.

My great grandfather had the goal of crossing the Mississippi river.  In 80 some years of life he never made it.  His daughter, my very dear Great Aunt who was nicknamed Dude for her gumption, lived all over the country. In the 30's and 40's she made a life for herself that was unprecedented.  She drove trucks for the us army, got divorced, and worked as a secretary at nasa in the height of the space race.  When she died she left a box full of pins from almost every state in the Union and a few from our northern neighbor.  I found a plastic potato to represent Iowa and more state flags than I can remember.  Also, embarrassingly, some Canadian provinces that I didn't know existed.

Hard to reconcile that with the fact that until the age of 16 she had never left the very small town of Candler to make the now 20 minute by car, trek to Asheville.  At 16, little Dude finally left the confines of Candler to see the small city of Asheville. 

Technology caused time and space to shift so drastically during her lifetime.  I drive that distance everyday in a car traveling at 65 miles an hour.  

What a hugely different experience we have with time and space than our forefathers.  It's easy to think that the ones who came before us were ignorant and wrong, but are we right?  Just because I can fly 2,000 miles across the country, it doesn't mean that my limited brain can understand the space I've traveled, or that my body's reflexes can make that shift in time as quickly as I'm moving in space.  

Right now, I look at a map, and cannot imagine that I flew across all of that land...all of that space, without touching any of it.  I cannot conceptualize the distance, only to be back across the country on the east coast at work on monday morning.  

My great grandfather must have felt the same way, looking at a map tracing the line representing the great Mississippi, a faraway and unimaginable landmark that he would never see.