SEA SHELLS BY THE SEASHORE

When I was little girl, my paternal grandparents went to Florida each winter. My grandfather loved to fish and spent his days fishing with a friend. My grandmother would go to the beach on Sanibel Island and pick up shells. She had quite a collection from over the years. She loved to get the shells out and look at them. But when she went into the nursing home, she couldn't take them with her so she gave them to my mother. I'm not sure if she really wanted them or just didn't want my grandmother to feel bad that no one wanted what she had spent so much time gathering. My mother kept them in the shirt boxes that my grandmother had so loving layered them in between the cotton batting. My mother was afriad that after she died no one else would want them. So, I decided to find a way that I could take them. I didn't want to just hide them away in a drawer somewhere, but I also didn't want them displayed where I would have to dust them constantly. I decided to display them in a large apothecary jar. That way they would be out to enjoy, but not be a bother. I know my grandmother was proud of her findings as she would tell us the names of each different kind of shell she had found. I have sand dollars, sea horses, starfish, clam shells, turkey feet and lots of others that I don't remember the names for. They constantly remind me of my grandmother who collected them and also my mother who lovingly kept them until someone else stepped up and said 'I'll take them now.'