vacation

I've been away so long, I hardly remember how to do this.  Let's see. . .We were a whirlwind of end-of-school activity and then we left for our family vacation just two hours after the last day of school.  If you don't know, my father was born and raised in Alabama and when I was a child we'd return each summer to visit his parents.  One week in the miniscule town where they lived in central Alabama, and another heavenly week at the coast.  The week at the beach is now a long-standing tradition that has bent and curved to hurricanes, deaths, teenagers' schedules, but it's been uninterrupted again for ten years now.  Even thought my father has been gone for five.  We just can't give up the memories, the white sand, the warm water, the time.

I know I should segue here.  Right into BP territory.  Right into outrage and disgust.  But I don't want to.  Is it the definition of shallow to ignore the things that interfere with your enjoyment of life?  There was no ignoring the oil.  It appeared on our beach the day before we left and the fumes were terrible.  The awful clinging stickiness of it was enough to send you into panic all over again.  But I want to show you all the beautiful things.  And I don't think they're shallow at all.

On our way:

To where we're going:

To jump:

And eat:

And walk:

And dream: