Detritus

Define kramerwetzel.com

Define detritus? It’s the flotsam and jetsam that washes up on the beach of life. Some treasures, some rough stuff.

Years ago, on a beach in Mexico, when it was safer to be there, one buddy explained, as the Pacific washed away sand and exposed soft, round pebbles, “The sea is a woman,” he said.

It sounded better in Spanish.

Might’ve been, “The ocean is like a lady,” as translation, like memory tends to be porous and sometimes largely subjective.

Along the Texas Gulf Coast, especially in the winter, the beaches collect an immense amount of organic trash. Seaweed, driftwood, an occasional bottle, some plastic rope, all kinds of crap.

I have a favorite image, a child’s toy, surrounded by the winter shore’s collection of debris.

Detritus.

Never can tell what will wash up.

The winter beach is comforting. One December day, alone on the beach, chasing the birds and watching the waves, I marveled at way the water meets the sky, and the dying sea vegetation curled around the occasional object, man-made, or otherwise.