Showcase by Susan L.

I built a new top for an old hall table yesterday. A glass display case for shells and treasures collected over the years. It's funny what I kept when I left my marital home. It's funny what was important. It seems a shame to keep these little treasures stashed away in a box under the bed. They represent trips with family, trips alone to visit family. Trips with good friends. It makes me realize just how many beaches I've been blessed to walk on. There's a jar filled with fossilized shark's teeth picked up at Nokomis Beach, Fla. when my youngest son was a boy. Paua shells and cowries from New Zealand and Fiji when I was given the opportunity to see my son and his partner who were teaching there. I picked up a fossil shell from St. Josephs beach last summer on a trip with a good friend. The Dominican Republic gave a few treasures, too on a trip to visit my daughter who was working there. Simply deciding how to display them has brought back a delightful collection of memories. It's almost like the glass cover is a window into the past. And it is Family Day after all. "A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in His holy habitation. God sets the solitary in families." Ps 68:5