Barefoot in the Glass

There is a beach near Vladivostok in Ussuri Bay that is beckoning for a fairy tale. Instead of just sand, this beach seems to be covered in gemstones. As I walked it for the first time Sunday, I tried to come up with a story.  I could see a place where people dropped offerings to God in thanks for the beautiful view, giving God a wonderful view in return. I imagined a magician casting a wonderful spell on the nearby volcano making it cast out liquid emerald, ruby, sapphire and amber that cooled into colorful jewels.


This beach is one of the only places on the planet where litter has been turned into beauty. (There's a glass beach in Fort Bragg, California.) Apparently, there was once a porcelain factory that regularly dumped its unwanted glass, ceramics and porcelain into the river or bay or onto the beach (depending on which story you read). Over the years, it has been smoothed and now lies glistening in the sun and water. Where it's dry, the colors are dusty and muted; where it's wet, they gleam and sparkle. Both are beautiful. (If you want to see some good pictures, Google glass beach in Vladivostok. They have much better pictures than I do.)

Here are some treasures lying in the dark, volcanic sand.

As much as we strike out against nature, it fights back against our "progress" in many ways. As annoying as it is in our driveway, I love seeing plants growing up between the cracks of sidewalks and patios. You're not going to stop me! They proclaim. In this case, nature has also protected us from ourselves by smoothing out the glass so that you can walk barefoot on it. I'm told the beach is most beautiful in the winter when the colors shine in the snow.


I wanted to play around and take an artsy picture. Here's my effort. Let me explain the somewhat disturbed expression on my face. At first, I lay down and spread out my hair to get a picture of myself with the glass around me. My friend Mary noticed how close to the breaking tide I was. I knew I was quite close because I could hear it. She watched and told me when to snap so that I could get the white of the tide breaking just out of reach of my head. Just as she was telling me the tide was near and I was ready to snap the picture, her voice changed as though I were in mortal peril of being covered by the water. I looked like I was in the middle of a curse, which I wasn't. So I'm not publishing that picture. I then lay there waiting for about five minutes for another wave to break nearby. Apparently those other waves were rogue, because no more came near enough for me to see in a selfie. (Why I didn't ask Mimi, who had the good camera with her, to take a quick picture, I don't know.) So I moved closer to the water. And waited. And waited. Patient Mary told me to get ready. As you can see, when this wave broke, it seeped down under my neck and into my shirt explaining this expression.

I looked prettier in the other pictures I took without the waves (you'll have to take my word for that), but I think this one is much more interesting.

One goal Douglas and I set for ourselves was to get out and do things like attend concerts. Last weekend, we saw The Firebird and vignettes from various ballets at the Mariinski Theater. It was lovely. The pianist and a cellist played Saint Saens' The Swan as a ballerina glided en pointe across the stage Her arms were liquid as they fluttered and alternately went above her head like the swan's neck and head, then contortionist-like behind her back as its wings. It was exciting - even scary with the dancing demons and special effects. Red glitter fell as fire in one scene. The demons' costumes were painted with paint that changed their appearance as they moved around the stage in and out of black lights. Last night, while Douglas was in Yakutsk, I went to see Serenade - a ballet by Balanchine - and The Carmen Suite, which uses music from Bizet's opera Carmen. Even I could tell a difference in the Balanchine ballet, though I'm not sure I can verbalize it. One thing that struck me was the lack of constant balance - four dancers on one side, four on the other and the principal in the center. Also, there were times that the company danced far stage left or right and some were momentarily in the wings out of sight.

I am going to Bachata dance classes Monday and Thursday evenings. I am reminded of why I was never on cheer or pom in high school. I can do all the moves, but when we put them in order in a dance, I can never remember what comes next, so I'm always a beat behind. Sigh. But, the teacher wants to learn to speak better English, so I show up early on Thursday evenings so we can talk. She's kind enough to split our time between English for her and Russian for me.


I attended the Consulate's English language book club and was pleasantly surprised to recognize two people there: my dance teacher and one of the drivers from the Consulate. When Douglas and I were in Silver Spring, we each sang in a couple of choruses. Through our connections there, we wound up singing with other groups on occasion. It was fun to attend events in such a big place where we knew relatively few people and run into familiar faces. I hope that continues to happen for us here.

These are the keys to the lighthouse (our townhouse). Rather large. The red is for the back ("neighbor") door; the black is for the front door. It barely fits into the pocket of my exercise shorts when I go running. Next month, I'll post some pictures of our townhouse - after our stuff arrives.

That glass beach is just tugging at me to write. At first, fairy tales came to mind. Now, I'm feeling more philosophical, poetical. When the glass was first dumped, walking on it barefoot would have shred your feet. Today, after the ocean has tossed it around, it is smooth. Today, our society is in the raw glass, shredded feet stage of some contentious issues. We need to keep tossing them around in order to smooth them out. So let's keep talking about the president, immigration, the environment, sex and religion. We need to talk and we need to listen without an agenda. The ocean had no agenda with the littered shards, it just kept tossing them around and look what happened.


I have special files for the novels I'm working on called streams. These files are where I write random thoughts and ideas about the story or a scene or character. Usually it's not very good writing, but it gets me thinking and it gets me in the chair writing, working. I think that we need to allow for this in ourselves and each other when we discuss things. We need to allow ourselves to hear outrageous statements by others without editing them, shutting them down or insulting them. We need to feel comfortable making awkward statements and risk having them misconstrued while we work out or feelings and seek the truth. Saying I don't wish to discuss this won't ever get us there. That not only shuts others down, it shuts us down. It prevents others from ever understanding us and it allows us to remain incapable of expressing our perspective. I'm going to challenge myself and you, dear readers, to listen without assigning too much gravity to what the speaker is saying - maybe they're still working it out and they need to hear it come out their own mouth before they know how they sound. And allow yourself to speak and correct yourself and contradict yourself and admit you were wrong or admit you have no factual basis for what you're saying - you just think it.  I got this idea from the glass beach. Maybe it makes sense; maybe it doesn't. Maybe writing like this explains why I'm not a poet. Then, again, maybe this is why I should be a poet.