The Journey
I love sea glass.
Not so much the actual objects themselves—though they are always beautiful—but the IDEA of sea glass and how it comes to be: Its journey from raw mineral to found art.
Man takes sand and refines. Heats and shapes. Polishes. Packages. Sells. Someone buys it, uses it, possibly even loves it.
Then—inevitably—it is broken, lost, discarded.
And it finds its way to the sea where a life begins again. She remakes, sculpts, softens, reduces and carries it across time and tide, returning it home transformed.
When it arrives on the beach, many hears and countless miles have passed. The glass has changed: shape, texture, even purpose.
Sea glass somehow always becomes beautiful.
Like us, pressure, heat and friction takes a raw thing and forms something else entirely. The sea of life takes a human mind and heart and reforms it, the results are not always considered a thing of beautify—at least not by the one remade.
I often wonder:
How does the glass see itself in its new form as the hand of warmth begins to caress it?
The tide recedes, it is nestled in a bed of perfectly smooth sand, still wet before the heat of the day can close out the night’s work. Does the little green or blue bit of detritus think itself a newfound gem and wait for the plucker to come and pluck?
Reflection
Or, more likely, does it think of its humble beginnings and how at one time it was so loved and lauded? As it was packaged and moved with care, then used so powerfully. Before that moment that disaster struck and it found itself cast aside and useless.
Become refuse.
Is it sad as it reflects on the long journey of so many miles? Or the maddening back-and-forth of the surf as it rolled across the sea floor? How hard it must have been when it smashed against the coral that broke it in pieces, dashing all hope that it might one day find itself beheld and loved again.
I think of its state when covered with the algae that would blur and blot its view of the world. And how lost it must have felt when wedged between the rocks and covered with sand. Lost in an eternity of darkness.
“All these things that have befallen you are what are common to sea glass. You shall not be overlooked.” ~ Book of Glass 10:13
Lost in the forest of a vast ocean, it cannot see itself, only feel its casting aside. Where it was once clean and pristine and useful, a thing loved because of its purpose, its usefulness—it would now find the transition difficult and the future unknowable.
The glass fears.
Until that day, the plucker plucked the newly made glass from the wet sand at the end of its journey.
At first, the glass doesn’t understand—it only knows exhaustion and surprise. But then, lifted into the sun, it realizes it is being seen. Loved, even.
Redemption
Now, with it’s bulk cut away by time and tide, it’s flashy shine worn to a satisfyingly gritty finish, it would bend and wield light in new and unexpected ways, exciting to all beholders, even the glass itself.
The tiny rock-like thing would suddenly discovered it was handled with care not because it served some grand purpose, but because it was beautiful. It would now be cherished because of it’s journey, not the leverage it gave its holder.
Elevated from commodity to high art, the humble glass would now find that it’s former uses were merely steps on a much longer journey to a crowning place in an artisan’s palette.
Then the glass would rediscover pride, not in arrogance and superiority, but a pride in feeling seen... beheld as a thing of beauty unlike any other in the world. It would see there were others like, brothers and sisters, but not exactly as the sea glass was.
It would feel the warmth and love with which it was held as it was crafted and made even more attractive still when the artist matched the glass stone to a similar piece and set them in silver and gold.
Until, one sunny fall afternoon when a man and women the glass had never seen before would pluck it again. This time from a brilliantly lit carousel filled with other gems of sea glass set as bracelets, necklaces and earrings.
As the sea glass dangled and twinkled from the woman’s ear at dinners, parties and gallery visits, the glass would not only see a world it never imagined possible, it would finally understand that its purpose was never in the first or even second life.
Here, nestled next to a lovely lithe neck silky and smooth where it would cast subtle blue kisses against the skin in the moonlight, it will have found its purpose:
To be held,
To be seen,
To feel loved and beautiful even as it made her even more so.
Wow!!!!!!! What a beautiful perspective.