The Beach

After the war, we went to the beach at Scheveningen for a week.  My mother, who was never a slave to fashion, is wearing the coolest sunglasses in these photos.  If she were here, she would give me her sardonic, "Puh," for putting  "fashion," "coolest," and "Mother" in the same sentence.  I think she is beautiful.

You can "Puh" me all you want Mother, but you were beautiful.  You had thick, dark hair, the bluest eyes,  high cheek bones to die for, and a perfect Grecian nose.

I liked the sand.  It was compact and easy to shape.  Near the end of the week, jelly fish appeared, purple and repulsive on the sand.  I remember tip-toeing carefully around them.

Mother must be pregnant with Toni, unless this is 1946, in which case, I am 4, Gerard 3 and Janie 1.

How do I know it was Scheveningen?  I don't.  Even writing a few lines of history is like writing fiction.  It was a beach in the Netherlands.  That's all I know.