Two Boys on a Beach
/The Boston Herald
Maybe God is watching these two boys and their dog. Maybe they are enough to keep Him from giving up on the world for one more day. They are enough for me. They are 10 or 11and as skinny and wiry as pipe cleaners, children still, playing on a beach in Hawaii. And because it is early on a Sunday morning they have the beach to themselves.
I watch from a distance. I watch them race along the water’s edge, their long cotton shorts wet and baggy but they don’t care. They have no vanity, no consciousness of how they look. They have no ego, no plans, no agenda. They are two boys as free as birds, doing what they were born to do - running, laughing, jumping in and out of the water, their dog at their heels.
They run at first with the dog on a leash. It is a mottled thing, tan and brown and leggy and, like the boys, it was born to run. The taller boy holds the leash and the dog tugs and strains and pulls at it. And though the boys run fast, the dog runs faster. So they set it free and that’s when they charge; that’s when they all go into overdrive and I think about wildlife documentaries and the images of herds of animals that run this way for miles.
Back and forth they go, the dog in the lead, the dog always beating them. They run on the dry sand and on the wet sand and in the water. And they run without stopping. When they finally quit, it’s to throw sticks to the dog. The dog loves this game. It kicks up sand in its frenzy to catch a stick in mid air. And though it never does it never stops trying.
After a while the boys put the dog back on the leash and the three of them walk to the far end of the beach where there is a thin finger of land only ankle deep in ocean water. This land is there because it is low tide and even the boulders covered in moss are almost dry at the top. Surrounding this jut of land, six feet above, on sandy ground, there are trees with thick brown trunks and green weepy leaves, bent over, leaning toward the ocean casting dark shadows. It’s more bayou than beach here. But there it is.
When the tide comes in this bayou will disappear. The rocks will be submerged, the cove will be covered and only the low bending trees will be the same. But for now the tide is out. So the boys play a new game. They gather sticks and stones and kneel on the ground and try to build a dam. The dog doesn’t understand this game at all. It steals the sticks and runs to the end of its leash and though the boys take the sticks out of the dog’s mouth, the dog doesn’t stop. So they set the dog free and it wanders while they build. And it picks up sticks and takes them to the boys.
A man arrives on the sandy ground above the cove between the weepy trees. He’s wearing a red and white shirt and he whistles and the boys look up and the dog flies to him.
The dam isn’t finished. And the tide is coming in. But the boys don’t beg, “Can we stay? Pleeease!” They stand up and follow the man.
They have done this before. And they will do this again. They will run on the beach tomorrow and the next day and the day after. They will throw sticks and their dog will chase them. They will hike up their falling down pants without embarrassment and they will build another dam.
It isn’t meant to last – a dam, a bayou at a beach, childhood. The tide comes in. You can’t slow it down. But I bet God has a special place in his heart for skinny little boys who try.
