Getting Settled by Susan L.

  The suitcase is unpacked. The laundry done. The few special shells I brought home have been brushed with mineral oil to help preserve them and bring out the colours. Later today I'll wipe off the excess and put them in my display table. It's the glass topped box I built last year with an old, cast iron, Singer sewing machine treadle as its base. It's nice to see them all the time instead of having these simple souvenirs of many travels stashed in a box somewhere.
 On Monday past, mom had company at the condo for a couple of days. It was fun to introduce them to shelling on the island. I was asked how I found the "good" ones. For a few moments I blathered on about low tide, getting up in the morning, how every day it was a different beach with different opportunities, and so on. But when I said, "More often than not, it's simply a matter of being in the right place at the right time." I felt the air hum.
  Shortly after this conversation I headed down to the beach for my morning, delightfully bare foot, walk/shell hunt. The beach was crowded already with other walkers and shellers. The air was warm, the sun bright, the water gently lapped at the shore. There was an excitement in my heart that something special was going to be found this morning, more so than other mornings. Sure enough, an hour into my walk, along a path many others had walked before, just at the edge of surf and sand was a beautiful, caramel coloured, horse conch shell about four inches long. The biggest one I'd ever found before was maybe half an inch long. Even those were rare.
  My mom's been going to Sanibel for twenty-eight years and has never found one like it. My words had  proven prophetic. I guess that's why I felt the air hum. With a silly grin and an offering of gratitude for this simple treasure, I knew it was God's doing that I was in the right place at the right time.
  Thank You Lord for simplicity. For simple times and simple treasures. Thank You Lord that I am no longer swept up in the rat race of "gotta haves"; that my life is one where great enjoyment is found celebrating the wondrous works of Your hands.
  "So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the waters abounded, according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good." Gen 1:21