This is a picture of a candle on my work table. We sit out in my garage studio sometimes at night, when the weather is clement and the wind is right, and when NFL football isn't on TV.
The candle is nestled in the curve of a broken conch shell I found on a beach on Hatteras Island, nearly thirty years ago.
I loved that place; there I could lose myself in the sound and vibration of the earth. The surf crashed when I would hit the beach at five am, and the sound sustained me, water washing around my legs as I fished, until ten, when I would break for some sort of breakfast. Then I would hurry back down to the surf, cast in, and fish until mid-day, maybe with a nap, lying in the sand. At five in the evening, I'd rejoin the family to either cook the fish I had caught, or go to dinner if I'd come up empty.
I never look at that beaten conch shell without remembering the beauty and peace of those days.
I hope Hatteras Island hasn't taken too big a beating from Hurricane Sandy.
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