Eating ice cream on a cold, blustery day

Real family, virtually shared
St. Thomas, ON
May 2019
This photo originally shared on Instagram

On a cold, grey, windy day, we took the kids to Port Stanley, a beachside community on Lake Erie's north shore, about 45 minutes from home.

The weather virtually guaranteed that no one was going in the water. But that wasn't the point of the day, anyway. Sometimes life just weighs on you, and sometimes the only answer is to get out of the house and explore a bit.

So we dug our toes into the cool, damp sand, closed our eyes to avoid the worst of the wind, and ate food that would make a nutritionist cringe as it soothed our soul. Because food can kinda do that if you let it.

Mostly, we just drank the day in, and spent the kind of time together that just hasn't been possible for much of the past few months. It's easy to forget to breathe when you're so focused on making it to the next day. It's easy to stay inside, literally and figuratively, when all you want to do is withdraw.

So we stepped out and reconnected with the things that make our family tick. We bantered. We laughed. We got lost (correction: I got lost, and Debbie and the kids patiently reeled me back in, or simply waited.) We took pictures. Many pictures. We were simply ourselves, and it was glorious.

I'd like to think when all is said and done, what we leave behind are seeds, traces, echoes of moments that mattered, moments that reminded us that life can be sweet. I'd like to think that days like this are what our kids will hold closest to them as they continue to grow into the incredible people they're destined to be.

I'd like to think a lot of things, but sometimes I think I just need to stop thinking, and instead get in the car and point it toward the beach. Thankfully my favorite people seem to agree.

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