I decided to share a short story I wrote a few years back. I don't know how, but I had forgotten about it. So, here it is... with photos to go with!!
The Mercantile
Salt water is splashing down on the nearby shore. I’m standing in the middle of a peculiar shop filled with riches plucked from the ocean and abandoned furniture revitalized with a fresh flair… and I’m grinning from ear to ear. For over thirty years, my life drifted through the seasons in a rural farming town in Northwestern Wisconsin, nowhere near the salty ocean. I knew nothing more than storybook winters filled with snow while looking forward to the hot sticky summer days where we could be fishing alongside the local potholes, or chasing fireflies under the heavy cloak of a country night.
My childhood memories now play in my head like an old Country Time lemonade commercial. I remember like it was yesterday, the sunny afternoons I carried coffee out to my dad while he was busy working the rolling fields then running up the hill to play in the apple orchard trees. The spring mornings where songbirds carol in the lilac bushes below my bedroom window in the farmhouse; their fragrance wafts through the open window and, even now, I can hear the curtains rustle in the sweet perfume of that breeze.
Times may have been tough for my folks, who spent endless hours tending to the rigors of our dairy farm. They exchanged that life for the tumultuous endeavor of running a small general store and animal rehabilitation farm, but they never once left my four siblings or I to enjoy anything less than the good life. They instilled within each of us devoted gratitude and a strong work ethic. To this day, they continue to support and encourage us all as we travel along through our own adventures in life.
My mom possesses a fine appreciation for antiques and can reanimate the old and broken. Dad has an uncanny knack for craftsmanship and can build, fix or mend virtually anything he gets his hands on. Though I have learned to appreciate these attributes in more recent years, as a child my head was in the clouds, or rather, in the ocean. The collections I’d amassed throughout my youth consisted of a colorful bounty of seashells and corals. I buried my nose in the writings of Jacques Cousteau and seashell encyclopedias, daydreaming about becoming a marine biologist, but never believing I would leave Wisconsin to see the ocean firsthand.
Guided by my zeal and with my family’s support, my adventures eventually led me to the coast. The beaches lining South Carolina were my first taste of coastal living. Since then, my life has led me to relish the allures of the Pacific Northwest, and yes, this is a stunningly beautiful place to live.
Being from a mid-states farm, I never knew how mesmerizing seaside towns could be, nor could I have fully anticipated the magnitude of the ocean’s wonder. The waves unfurling, reaching as if to beckon me nearer. Their mystery hugs my expanding imagination, relentless in retreat, but I prefer it this way. The song of the sea rolls through my soul with an earthy heartbeat. The tincture of the briny air tattoos itself upon my senses. I suspect the ocean has this effect on everybody, though I like to believe we have a secret kinship.
It's in the little treasures, like those found in this mercantile, that I find the perfect balance between my rural childhood and the enchantments of the ocean. Country bumpkin meets beachy chic in splendid accord with rustic grace and beauty. It takes me back and carries me away all at the same time.
My Zen is here, in this quaint shop. Comforts of antiques and refurbished pearls of past, mingled with seashells and nautical embellishments, clamoring together to make serene harmony that begs my eclectic spirit to dance. Twine ropes and barn boards married to barnacles and anchors have my name etched upon their lingering rust and tattered fibers as they lie in wait for life anew. I can hear the echoes of my youth reverberate as the ocean does from within the purloined conch shell. Everything seems to tell the story of my journey from life on the simple farm to my undying romance with the ocean.
“Yes, I do believe I have just the spot for you,” I say to each newly acquired fragment of seaside heaven. I think fondly of how much Mom and Dad would appreciate this place; both the mercantile itself and where I have am in life. Here in both, I feel like a kid again.
“The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonders forever.” Jacques-Yves Cousteau
