The beach stretches endlessly away, encircling an island…

Our journey, begun at birth, whether short or long, will return us to the spot where the journey began…

Only the size of the island is in doubt…

For some, it is a decades-long trek around a continent of joys and sorrows, challenges and moments of peace and rest…

For others, it is one small rock, the tip of a weather-worn volcano in a turbulent sea, and their journey is done before it has even begun, tiny feet bestriding the distance all at once like a colossus that will never be…

At times, ours are the only footprints…

More often than not, our footprints are just one in a multitude, as others join us on our quest…

It is those moments when there are two sets of prints, walking side by side, that life and meaning coalesce…

Because it is never an easy journey…

There are obstacles to overcome…

A hand to hold when leaping tide pools to land on slippery, barnacle encrusted rock, can make all the difference…

The sea, to one side of us, that provides for our needs, can also rage at us, sending storm and crashing waves, indifferent as it is beautiful…

The land, on the other side of us, that gives us sustenance and shares its bounty, has its own dangers…

The sea is our mother, the womb we sprang from long ago, and she feeds us, yet we cannot drink from her bosom…

The land feeds us as well, and gives us of her streams and rivers, and yet, we must somehow cross those streams and rivers, and she does not always break our falls gently…

Above all looms the sky, as majestic as land and sea, and as moody…

The sky warms us, or freezes us, delights us with sunsets and sunrises, or hides away in mist and fog, cools and refreshes us with showers or pounds us with storms…

We walk…

We grow…

We learn…

We pause to rest, or trudge on, depending on our nature, but to stop the journey altogether is to cease living…

If there is a secret to this journey, it is this…

To accumulate possessions is not the goal, for they can weigh you down, encumber you, and, at the journey’s end, you must leave them behind, and when that time comes, I doubt that they will give you solace, or ease your way into the next part of the journey, you will not spend a moment contemplating them, admiring the vast pile you lugged with you…

What you will reflect on, what will give you joy and send you on your way with a smile on your lips, are those footprints that walked beside you, those deep indentations in the sand, or the deeper ones that appear by yours on the far side of a tide pool, where someone knew that you would be there to catch them when they leaped, or they were there to catch you…

When your journey ends, look ahead of you at where your journey began, and look behind you too, at the footprints in the sands of time, and cherish those spots where friendship and love are imprinted side by side…