HI-larious! Seriously funny. A few days ago we took D to a park area that had the latest craze in childhood: a multi-head fountain which spewed water from the concrete into the air for kids young and old to frolic. And frolic they do...except we've noticed that historically little boys "frolic" combat style doing kicks and punches into the jet streams and jostling each other for the highest parts of the spray. Poor D's been watching from the sidelines for months now since the concrete base and wild-bangee-atmosphere are not "crawler-friendly"zones. But with his new legs under him he's been b-lining to these fountain areas at every park we visit.

So alas, we decided this time to slowly, gently, guide him to the outer circle of the "fountain of terror" as I like to call it. I called dibs on the sidelines and so B was left with the daunting task of helping D maneuver around the area but not necessarily enter it since the day's heat had made the crowd large and rambunctious. I watched, tense but trying to give the appearance of relaxed. The boys circled and D squealed every time a few drops of nearby spray found his face or hands. I could tell he kept leaning in, trying to pull 6'4 B into the epicenter. B held on tightly, with big-man resolve to not let D go in any further. Finally after a few laps, a young feller a bit larger than D but at least within a few inches, exited the crazy zone for a breather. He had on shorts and no shirt and stood to the side dripping wet.

As fate would have it, he had unknowingly chosen a rest stop right off of D's interstate. Seeing it would take just a slight veer to pull B off the highway, D shifted his weight forward, dug in with the tiny treads on his sandals and managed to somehow get loose. I wish I could describe his face. It was pure delight. Pride even. He teetered and tottered and shuffled as fast as his little legs could take him in a serpentine fashion until he got within an arms length of the resting little boy. Without even a hesitation, D walked right up to him and slapped his pudgy little hand on the center of the boy's unclothed belly and left it there. I couldn't exactly tell from where I sat but I believe he even rubbed it in a circular motion. The young boy stood stunned and appalled for much longer than I thought possible or prudent. I simultaneously laughed and tried to beckon for B's intervention.

The young boy's father, a large man, stood just a few steps a way and looked amused but also confused. Evidently this wasn't your normal secret handshake. D had gotten the wrong memo and thought a good "buddha-belly-rub" was the way into the little-boy-at-the-fountain-of-terror handshake. The boy started to move away from D's hand and D just smiled and followed, undeterred. The way he saw it, the little boy just hadn't received the right memo. B finally took one large step in and swooped D before things could get any weirder. We laughed the entire way home.

Perhaps I'm over-reaching here...or perhaps I was so desperate for a little theatrics that morning on the beach. All I know is the empty red inhaler seemed the perfect ironic prop for that scene in my life's play. It was as if moments before I arrived, or perhaps even while I was staring at the ground a hundred yards away, God muttered quietly on His headset, "Stage manager to crew: can someone place item 246983 on the front of stage right in 3....2.....1...?" I remember chuckling while I snapped the photo with seagulls watching quietly but pensive like any good audience would.

After staring for quite some time I sensed my right arm was about to act independently from my brain and just reach down and grab the thing. Repelled at the right arm's lack of good sense, I pulled it back quickly, with a stern word that we would discuss the unsanctioned move more later. Everything about the inhaler made me think of breathing...the person who had used it in order to breathe, the way in which it dispensed medicated air to relieve a constricted airway....And then I thought about what that must feel like: your throat beginning to close and your lungs gripping your insides like a prisoner. My right hand went rogue again and placed itself on the bottom of my throat, rubbing a small circle at the meeting place of neck and the rest of me.

A tear jostled around the corner of my eye, as if in negotiations with an agent or something. Finally an agreement must have been reached, for it rushed onto stage with a flourish. I knew walking down to the water that morning that I needed salty air, thunderous water and unrelenting wind. I knew I needed to feel the realness of those things to remind my heart of counterfeit things. I also knew I needed to feel overwhelmed by that which I couldn't control...the wind, the water, the air...unbridled beauty that couldn't be arranged, performed for or impressed. What I didn't know, but my stage manager obviously did, was I needed reminded to breath, to think about breathing, and maybe even more importantly....to know that in those moments when my throat began to constrict and my lungs clamored angrily, He could provide an inhaler. Maybe next time He'll give me one that's not empty (ha ha)...or perhaps He just did and that was the whole point.

I finally managed to pull my gaze away from the littered object on the sand. A smile crept across my face as I turned it up into the air like our beloved old dog used to.