Pretty Little Pebbles

 A personal essay by Kassidy Bowen 

"The woods are lovely, dark and deep, but I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep" - Robert Frost

Plunk! Another pebble landed in the slated sea, adding texture to the already churning waves. I barely looked up from where I was squatting among the sea-smoothed stones. My siblings made a game of it, seeing how far they could throw, how many times they could skip the rocks, or how large a splash they could make in the Pacific. I didn’t join in, for I knew that once tossed into the swirling deep, the pebbles would be lost forever.

“Kassidy! You’re falling behind!” It was my mom. Still, I didn’t look up, trying to find the perfect prize for my growing collection. “Kassidy, your pockets are already bulging! Come on, there will be plenty of rocks at the next beach.” I sighed and picked up one more pebble and added it to my pockets which were in fact, to my mother’s credit, already bulging.

“Alright mom but look at this one! It’s so smooth! And this one here, look, when it’s wet it’s all spotted!” I exclaimed, thrusting a tiny fistful of rocks under my mother’s nose. She nodded, showing her enthusiasm in her raised eyebrows.

“That’s awesome babe! But we’ve got to keep going. We’ve got a few more beaches to hit today and then we’re off down the coast! There’s miles to go sweetie!” She took my hand and guided my clumsy feet as we toddled toward the van. As we walked, I thought about the rest of the trip, the miles of flawless sand, the piles of warped and weathered driftwood, the sea glass, the pebbles. I could hardly wait!

My parents used to tell me that they couldn’t take me anywhere in a hurry. There were just too many things to see, too many places to explore! My mom started bringing little bags wherever we went to hold the treasures I would inevitably find on our adventures. To her credit, she never discouraged my collecting. Yes, she would drag me along when my steps slowed to much, and more often than not she limited my collections to one bag per outing. But she always looked back on the stories with a smile. Personally, I couldn’t figure out why everyone else wasn’t doing the same. Could they not see the sparkles in the stones? Didn’t they wonder about the tales behind the trinkets?

Everyone a Collector

Perhaps they don’t. But everyone carries trinkets through their own lives. Some people have friendship necklaces or promise rings. For others, it’s a favorite pair of basketball shorts, or worn-out sneakers you just can’t seem to replace. Some people collect empty notebooks, waiting for the day that they’ll have something to scribble in the pages. We all cling to things that hold an ocean of meaning in our eyes.

As childhood melts into teenage years, it becomes less acceptable to pick up pebbles. I turned my sights to greater rocks to climb. My pockets instead began to fill with paper scraps and pencils. As I tried to move forward and create myself, I couldn’t change the fact that I was a collector through and through. In the absence of my little treasures, I collected glances, words, and ruminations. Stacked neatly on top of each other, I learned to use them to keep a thick wall around myself. My collections kept the world at bay. Safe behind them, I could set my sights on other things. I collected grades and achievements, adding them to the walls. I hoarded expectations, both from others and myself. Each thought and pressure settled deep into my heart.

The older I got, the harder I found it was for me to let go of all the little things. I found meaning in everything, emotions tethered me to every little piece of my surroundings. What started out as something wonderful became suffocating. I was no longer my own, rather an alarming amalgam of every place I’d ever been, every feeling I’d ever felt, every person who had ever walked through my life. Weighed down by the stories I’d collected, I could barely put one foot in front of the other.  Still, I couldn’t let go, and I had to keep going. “Miles to go” became my mantra.

The Long Way Home  

Education has always been important to me. Unfortunately, it costs more than a pretty penny. I have spent many long hours paying for my education. The first year was the most difficult. I worked in a noisy warehouse, often earning overtime in exchange for aching feet and a smaller social circle. Every cardboard cut and mind-numbing task I found myself thinking of the knowledge and experience it would buy me. Those achievements would improve my walls quite nicely. One such exhausting day, I decided to take the long way home. Instead of the freeway I took the backroad, liking the few extra songs it added to my commute. Too tired to sing, I simply let the lyrics drown out my thoughts.

Suddenly, the sprawling fields and little houses were interrupted by a swathe of gold. I looked up from the backroad, suddenly captivated by the light. Sunflowers. It was a field of wild sunflowers. In the dying day, they caught the light just right. They were dazzling. I wished I could look at them for hours, but my stomach grumbled, and the stiff fabric of my uniform was begging to be tossed into the hamper. I thought of the words to my favorite poem. With miles to go before I could sleep, I went on. My mind awakened, and I thought of what I’d cook for dinner, which chores I’d finish that evening, and how I could get a head start on tomorrow. As quickly as each thought flashed across my mind I added it to my mountain of cares.

“You always loved flowers,” I heard my mother say. “You used to make us pull over every time we saw them on the side of the road."

“That must have been annoying.” I chuckled back, knowing how impatient she could get. She only smiled, lost in a memory.

“I loved how it made you smile. I didn’t mind.”  

Her words echoed through my mind, drowning out the business and worry. I remembered what it was like, to be filled with wonder. I remembered the compulsory need to hold fast to every lovely thing. I couldn’t let them go. In an instant I felt myself cranking the steering wheel around, turning back the way I came. Pulling over alongside the sunflowers, I stepped out into the evening air.

The wild blooms waved gently in the breeze, petals shaking. I brushed my fingers lightly across their petals, lifting one gently to my cheek. Their bitter scent and feather-light touch against my skin felt so familiar to me. If I could, I would have sunk beneath the blooms and just laid there on the ground for hours. It felt so nice to forget the weight of the world for a moment, the golden petals so light in comparison. But, like the great Robert Frost, I had promises to keep. I departed with a fistful of tiny suns and left a bit of my cares in their place.

Little Hands for Little Pebbles  

Just this week I took my nieces for a walk around the block. I ran when they wanted to run, holding tight to their tiny hands so they wouldn’t catch their feet on the pavement. There were a thousand thoughts I had to sort through, a dozen tasks I hadn’t done. Still, I knew this little walk would do more for them than my work would for me. We made it around the loop and as we rounded the corner I looked down at their laughing faces. My foot knocked aside a rock that had fallen across my path. Immediately, my niece dropped my hand to chase it.

“Look Aunt Kass!” she waved it high in the air like she’d discovered gold. I smiled and took it from her. She immediately scurried off, eager to explore. The pebble felt cool to my touch, and I glanced down at it. At second glance, it really was quite beautiful. Round and red, veined with color like a tiny sunset. I looked up to ask if she wanted to keep it, but she had disappeared into the house. Quietly, I slipped it into my pocket.

Image credit: "Pebble Hunting" personal photo. Image credit: "Balanced" personal photo.