estate, we put in the equipment, we open the franchise. It’s pretty straight forward. Not like Shannon.
Okay that’s not fair. She’s very straight forward. I don’t mean simple or stupid or innocent. I just mean she is what she is. She told me not to pretend when I ate the berries even though I didn’t like them. She wasn’t offended that Mike was talking about sex. She’s straight forward. I think she says what she means, means what she says, does what she wants, and wants what she does. I guess she would have to be to make it as a woman in geology, which has to be a pretty male dominated world. Her geology papers and research are written in such a Spartan style that I can practically see her reading the papers in her quiet, thoughtful, no-nonsense voice.
There she is, jogging down to meet me, closer to where I parked. She isn’t waiting for me in front of her house.
Shannon and Joe
“ Let’s go this way today,” Shannon says.
I turn around, put my back to her house and the pier beyond it, and fall in beside her.
“ Okay,” I say. “I resist the urge to ask ‘why’? I resist the urge to ask anything.
Five minutes turns to ten without a word being said.
“ I’m going to pick it up for a mile or so. Don’t try to keep up. Just keep going your pace, or walk, and I’ll pick you up on the way back okay?” she asks.
“ Sure,” I say.
She pulls away easily, effortlessly. I slow down and watch. One of my favorite things is to watch people who are really good at something do that something. I don’t care what it is. Shooting baskets, pulling weeds, running, painting a house. I don’t care. I love mastery. And she is a master.
Watching a master is how I learned to make coffee, from watching the man who used to own the coffee shop.
She must be going at about a five thirty per mile pace. A speed I could match on my bike. Maybe.
I slow to a walk and watch her already small frame grow smaller and smaller as she pulls farther and farther away. I am reminded of what I was just thinking. That she will do what she wants, when she wants. I like that, even though it has left me walking alone on the beach where millions of tiny shells were washed ashore in the overnight high tide. Shells that crunch underfoot and remind me how the beach is never the same on any two mornings. You never walk the same beach twice. Sometimes I sift these shells looking for fossilized sharks’ teeth. Other times I wonder why there are three drift lines. I can figure out that one is from the last high tide and that one is from the last really high tide but the third drift line eludes my meager intellect.
I am walking alone, waiting for her to return. Knowing she will pick me up on her way back.
I see her slow then turn in the distance. She walks for a hundred yards, and then starts running again. And this time she is really running. Faster even than on the outward leg. I can see how fluid her motion is, how there is no wasted energy, how every moving part is doing exactly the right thing to propel this forty year old beauty towards me at an Olympic trial pace. Before I know it she is back beside me.
“ Nice,” I say.
“ Not bad,” she answers. She is breathing hard, sweating freely, and unashamed about her effort or sweat.
She walks along beside me while she catches her breath.
She breathes in the salt-tinged humid breeze coming in off the sun-flecked ocean. Sweat runs off her face and drops into the sand to join the salt from the reaching and receding waves. Dolphins cruise past us very close in to the shore. They are fishing in the early light, right on top of the sand bar. So close I can make out individual features on their fins.
“ They’re so beautiful,” she says. “I always think about swimming out to touch them.”
“ Yes they’re beautiful,” I answer. “But swimming out there to touch them is a bad idea. They will bite your finger off if they think it’s a fish. And while you can see the
Okay that’s not fair. She’s very straight forward. I don’t mean simple or stupid or innocent. I just mean she is what she is. She told me not to pretend when I ate the berries even though I didn’t like them. She wasn’t offended that Mike was talking about sex. She’s straight forward. I think she says what she means, means what she says, does what she wants, and wants what she does. I guess she would have to be to make it as a woman in geology, which has to be a pretty male dominated world. Her geology papers and research are written in such a Spartan style that I can practically see her reading the papers in her quiet, thoughtful, no-nonsense voice.
There she is, jogging down to meet me, closer to where I parked. She isn’t waiting for me in front of her house.
Shannon and Joe
“ Let’s go this way today,” Shannon says.
I turn around, put my back to her house and the pier beyond it, and fall in beside her.
“ Okay,” I say. “I resist the urge to ask ‘why’? I resist the urge to ask anything.
Five minutes turns to ten without a word being said.
“ I’m going to pick it up for a mile or so. Don’t try to keep up. Just keep going your pace, or walk, and I’ll pick you up on the way back okay?” she asks.
“ Sure,” I say.
She pulls away easily, effortlessly. I slow down and watch. One of my favorite things is to watch people who are really good at something do that something. I don’t care what it is. Shooting baskets, pulling weeds, running, painting a house. I don’t care. I love mastery. And she is a master.
Watching a master is how I learned to make coffee, from watching the man who used to own the coffee shop.
She must be going at about a five thirty per mile pace. A speed I could match on my bike. Maybe.
I slow to a walk and watch her already small frame grow smaller and smaller as she pulls farther and farther away. I am reminded of what I was just thinking. That she will do what she wants, when she wants. I like that, even though it has left me walking alone on the beach where millions of tiny shells were washed ashore in the overnight high tide. Shells that crunch underfoot and remind me how the beach is never the same on any two mornings. You never walk the same beach twice. Sometimes I sift these shells looking for fossilized sharks’ teeth. Other times I wonder why there are three drift lines. I can figure out that one is from the last high tide and that one is from the last really high tide but the third drift line eludes my meager intellect.
I am walking alone, waiting for her to return. Knowing she will pick me up on her way back.
I see her slow then turn in the distance. She walks for a hundred yards, and then starts running again. And this time she is really running. Faster even than on the outward leg. I can see how fluid her motion is, how there is no wasted energy, how every moving part is doing exactly the right thing to propel this forty year old beauty towards me at an Olympic trial pace. Before I know it she is back beside me.
“ Nice,” I say.
“ Not bad,” she answers. She is breathing hard, sweating freely, and unashamed about her effort or sweat.
She walks along beside me while she catches her breath.
She breathes in the salt-tinged humid breeze coming in off the sun-flecked ocean. Sweat runs off her face and drops into the sand to join the salt from the reaching and receding waves. Dolphins cruise past us very close in to the shore. They are fishing in the early light, right on top of the sand bar. So close I can make out individual features on their fins.
“ They’re so beautiful,” she says. “I always think about swimming out to touch them.”
“ Yes they’re beautiful,” I answer. “But swimming out there to touch them is a bad idea. They will bite your finger off if they think it’s a fish. And while you can see the
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