So here’s something strange that happened to me at the beach.  I’m turning it into two separate stories, because I want to leave this story open, still, for a magical happy ending.  But all together, it did make for a very difficult 24 hours.

All the women were in the water, and all the menfolk were on the beach watching the babies.  We were all feeling pretty blissful!

The weather was unbelievable:  blue skies, warm sun, stiff breeze making the spray off the top of the waves glitter like silver.

And fish!  little silver fish literally jumping out of the waves, all around us.

Suddenly I look down and I see this little fish swimming right up to me.  It was different from the others – brown, with gold stripes along the sides.  At first I was like, Hey!  Don’t be swimming into my bathing suit!  But then I realized it wanted to stay near me because I was wearing brown, and it was probably seeing me as a great place to hide.  So it was swimming around and around me in circles.  We were laughing – I said, “Hey fish, we’ve been seeing a lot of each other, but maybe you should move on.”  Nope.  This fish had chosen me and it was not leaving.  Around and around me in circles.  I got fond of it quite quickly – my little fish friend.  But still – it’s not like I could take it home, and I really didn’t want it to swim into my bathing suit.  And it just would not leave.

And then somebody said Maybe it’s one of those magical fish that grant wishes. 

So I wished.

And it swam away.

And you know what?  I know it sounds crazy but a really big part of my heart really does believe in magical fish that grant wishes.  I’m admitting this publicly because of what happened next.