It had been a long time since I was there; nearly 40 years to be exact. As I trudged through the thick sand, along the path through what is now a Nature Preserve, memories began to flood my mind. I could hear the youthful laughter of teenagers, excitedly filing off of a bus as the warm summer wind blew sand in their eyes. I could hear the faint crashing of waves and even smell the salt in the thick air from that day so many years ago. I could feel the innocence of a life, not-yet-lived, that held limitless possibilities.
For a moment, I couldn’t help but smile.
As I pushed further away from the road where my wife and I had parked, and closer to where I knew I needed to go, I felt a deep pain within my soul. It was a pain that I had lived with throughout most of my life since that day. It shaped me into the person I became…