Gift from the Sea

By Sallie Lewis

On an early morning this summer, I saw the sun rise over the Gulf of Mexico. With my feet in the sand, I stood alone on the beach, watching the light reflect off the water. Over the years, the Texas Gulf Coast has been home to many of my most cherished and visceral life memories. I can still taste the salt from the first Gulf oyster I ate off the half shell and feel the sand packed beneath my fingernails after long afternoons digging for clams. To this day, every trip I take to Rockport or Port Aransas on Mustang Island feels like coming home. In years past, I’ve enjoyed these coastal hideaways with friends and family over festive holiday gatherings, like the Fourth of July or New Year’s Eve. This year, however, I ventured south for the first time on my own.

Years ago, I read Gift from the Sea by famed aviator and best-selling author Anne Morrow Lindbergh. In it, she shares the lessons from her sabbaticals to Captiva Island on Florida’s Gulf Coast. Over the course of its pages, she muses about life, womanhood, and the restorative gifts of solitude through the lens of various seashells, like oyster shells, argonauts, double-sunrise shells, and channeled whelks. From the shells we inhabit to the shells we shed over the myriad stages of life, the sea’s symbolic treasures are profound teachers, and so was Lindbergh.

The first time I read Gift from the Sea I was in my early twenties, single, and newly graduated from college. Ten years later, I read it a second time, finding pearls of wisdom in Lindbergh’s luminous prose. Coincidentally, the book’s sixty-fifth anniversary this year coincided with a challenging time in my personal life. As I navigate my divorce, I have found solace on the sandy edges of my home state, with Gift from the Sea in hand.

Much like the author’s own experiences, my solitary days on the Texas coast gave me space to roam freely and unpack my emotions. I combed the shoreline looking for scallop shells and lightning whelks, each day bringing with it new treasures from the ocean floor. I watched as giant pelicans dove into the water, filling their throat pouches with glistening fish. I saw sandpipers and plovers wade for snacks in the surf and found unexpected beauty in a tiny chapel adorned with watercolor murals and swaying sea oats. Most importantly, I began to notice the rhythms of the Gulf, its ebb and flow, retreat and return like a hopeful promise.

Paying attention to nature’s cadence revealed the simplicity I craved in my own daily life. Though I had packed a suitcase full of clothes, shoes, and makeup for my trip to the beach, by the end of my stay, I realized how little I actually needed. Liberated and free, I embraced bare legs and sun-kissed skin, shoeless feet and wild sea hair.

While being alone with oneself, particularly on vacation, can be fear inducing for many, I’ve found it to be life enhancing. All of the tedious routines and mundane distractions back home—be they doctor’s appointments, bills, laundry days, or conference calls—are left behind, making room for stillness, silence, contemplation, and personal contentment. Some days, I rarely uttered a word, listening instead to the gull’s caw overhead or the soothing sounds of palm fronds rustling in the wind.

Each gift from the sea instilled in me a deeper reverence for Creation and a curiosity for the world that burgeons to this day.

One Saturday morning I woke up early, hopped on my bike, and peddled over to the Port Aransas marina. Giant seaweed-colored nets hung from the Peggy Ann shrimp boat, still glistening from their morning sweep. That day, I purchased a large sack of fresh jumbo shrimp; over the course of my stay, I sautéed them with lemon juice and garlic cloves, salty capers, and egg pasta. With every bite, I tasted the ocean and remembered my childhood.

Though many years have passed between my youth and now, I can still picture the cold coastal nights, sitting with my parents and siblings on the front porch of our beach house. Like a harp, the winter wind plucked gently at our hair as the moon rose over the sea. Together, we peeled boiled shrimp and shucked bushels of oysters, tucking our knives into the mollusk’s shadowy crevice and turning the blade until it clicked, like a key in a lock. I can still feel the warmth of the lantern light that illuminated our family dinners every evening. I remember strolling down the beaches in Port Aransas, feeling the buried disc of a sand dollar beneath my heel and hearing the soft echo of a seashell as it whispered its poetry from the deep. I can still see the augers, sundial shells, and frosted sea glass shimmering on the shoreline, brought forth by the tides and moon every evening.

Looking back at these early memories, I envision my younger self like a naturalist, moving slowly and intently as I searched for shells, studying the grooved shape of a cockle or the papery delicacy of an angel wing. Each gift from the sea instilled in me a deeper reverence for Creation and a curiosity for the world that burgeons to this day. I still think about where it all comes from, what life these shells lived before our paths came together, and what histories are written within their intricate spiraled interior. These mysteries are as deep as the sea itself, though pondering them makes me feel alive and awakened to the essential questions—the connectedness of all things.

Like Lindbergh, when I left the beach I returned home with beautiful shells and a restored spirit. One glance at the fragmented sand dollars in my bathroom reminds me of those special days spent alone on the Texas Gulf Coast and the clarity and peace I found on my journey. I know there are many more shells to find just as there are many more lessons to learn in life. I look forward to my next solo sojourn, waiting for the tide and its treasures to teach me something new.

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Sallie Lewis is a Texas-based freelance writer and journalist. She has a master’s degree in writing from Johns Hopkins University and is currently working on her first novel. Visit SallieLewis.co to learn more.