PEEK-A-BOO

After dinner my son Alex and I decided to take a drive down to the beach. There's a National Park by us called Sandy Hook, a peninsula that has the ocean on one side and the bay on the other.

We parked the car in the lot and made our way across the sand to some large jetty rocks by the ocean. As we climbed up on one of the rocks we could see the ocean, the waves gently tumbling onto the sand. We sat down and watched as fisherman, further down the beach, set up their equipment along the edge of the water. Right in front of us several poles were lined up on the sand, waiting for the next nibble, but no one seemed to be around to tend them.

“I'm so glad you're Dad isn't into fishing.” I said to Alex.

“Why?” he was sitting on his own jetty rock.

I shook my head. “I don't know. I really don't like the taste of fish and I wouldn't want him coming home with a cooler filled with them and wanting me to gut and clean them.” I shuddered at the thought. “Yuck.”

Just then a man popped up from the other side of the boulder I was sitting on. He didn't look our way but went directly to the fishing poles in front of us.

Alex looked over at me, his eyes opened wide. “Do you think he heard you?” he whispered.

I shrugged my shoulders. “I'm not sure how he couldn't.” I leaned over the boulder and saw where he'd been sitting on the sand leaned up against the boulder I was sitting on. “Want to go over to the bay side now?” I asked.

Alex got up first then reached over to help me down from my perch. “Thanks.” I hopped down onto the sand. “Well that was embarrassing.” I laughed as we walked back through the parking lot, crossed the road and walked through the section that had been cut through the dunes.

“Whew,” I covered my nose as the low tide smell hit me. “It's stinky over here.”

I spotted something close to the tide line and walked over to it then crouched down. “It's a horseshoe crab!” I cried waving Alex over to me.

“Do you think it's still alive!” He asked as he came to stand next to me.

“I don't know.” We both stared at the motionless armored creature.

Alex pointed to another one half buried in the sand a few feet away. “It's like they're playing the worst game of hide and seek.” he laughed. “You know how little kids put a towel over their heads and think they're hiding?”

I had to laugh then quickly stopped. “Wait a minute.” I looked around and saw several more partially buried in the sand. “It's low tide.”

“I know. I can smell it too.” Alex began to step back.

“DON'T MOVE!” I cried.

Alex froze. “What's wrong?”

“They've come up on the beach to lay their eggs and the tide went out before they were done. That's why they've buried themselves in the sand! They're waiting for the tide to come back in.” I looked around and could see even more crabs. The drag lines from their shells were all over the beach. I slowly stood up. “Watch where you're walking.” I gingerly stepped over another crab. “We don't want to step on any of them.”

Alex and I must have looked ridiculous as we hopped and leaped over what other people watching us would think were imaginary objects. When I finally felt we were safely out of their egg laying area I turned back to Alex. “Well, that certainly was exciting!”

“Exciting?” Alex began brushing the sand I'd kicked up off his legs.

I looked back over to the horseshoe crabs. “I haven't seen that many horseshoe crabs since I was little girl.” I smiled as I looked at Alex. “I'm just so excited to see so many!”

Alex smiled. “I'm glad you're so excited.” he tipped his head towards the parking lot. “Now do you want to head back to the car before the fisherman you insulted packs up and we find out we're parked next to him.”

“Oh yeah.” I grimaced as I headed towards our car. “I forgot about him.”