Walking Meditation or Obsession
Steel Gray Jewel
Story of a modern day hunter-gatherer
Sharks have been swimming in the sea for more than 400 million years.
We humans, newcomers on the scene, have a fascination bordering on compulsion when given the opportunity to find their fossilized teeth.
Head down, walking in a slow, trancelike fashion, hunter after hunter makes her way along the shoreline.
Some use the cumbersome “Florida snow shovel”, that heavy metal basket on a pole, to scoop up large gobs of sand which they will paw through like a racoon looking for grubs. Others walk the beach oblivious to the construction of emerging castles, bumping into anyone in their way. They are on a mission, obsessed with finding the next treasure. One man shows me his best find of four years. It is a perfectly shaped, two-inch-long steel grey jewel.
As I walk, head down, searching, I train my eyes to hone in on the characteristic color and shape, and the way the light reflects on the tooth’s surface. I learn the hard, smooth feel of the enamel between my fingers, and soon it becomes a walking meditation with the sound of the surf as my mantra. My mind wanders back to happier days when my children searched for these teeth. Intent on the search, and with precious memories taking me to another time and place, I often…
