Fried Soup

     After lying around for most of the day and viewing my Grandmother’s pictures from her trip to Israel, we really wanted to go someplace that wasn’t my grandparent’s house. Jeliya and I did get 14k gold necklaces from her, though, with our names spelled out in Hebrew. This just proves that Thai relatives love to give gold. After being dragged out of the house, we suffocated in the heat. Florida just isn’t the same as Oregon. We went down to ‘Honeymoon Island’ to go to the beach. It was terrific! The water was clear, there were plenty of shells, and it was warm. Warm ocean water is not something you get in Oregon usually. Where the water became a little deeper it got too cloudy to see through, but we met a mother and a daughter hunting for sand dollars. As it turns out, there were plenty of sand dollars in the softer sand. My mom found the first one, and when I picked it up for her, I made it bleed. I learned that sand dollars bleed easily and their blood is yellow. I also discovered that it is impossible not to step on sand dollars once or twice. Rest in peace, all those broken sand dollars.

      My grandfather was floating on a blue noodle out in the ocean when the fish started coming. The first sighting was a white fish, long and slightly silvery, jumping in and out of the water. Then, I started continually whacking or stepping on something slimy by accident. Once, by luck, I looked under the water and caught a glimpse of my own personal fish. Later I collected more, but my first fish was white and had grayer fins. I think they think of your legs as some kind of shelter. When schools of fish came, they swam right under the water surface. One swam continually in tight circles around my grandfather. It was about as big as my hand and was entirely gray with yellow highlighted fins. As it was time to go, Jeliya and I collected shells. We discovered an incredibly beautiful one with a golden inside that resembled a sunset.

Later, we were late to Sweet Tomatoes but we enjoyed stuffing our faces.