No matter how hard you try to screw up your kids, somehow they manage to become incredible people. (Who knew?)

My sister and I often love to walk the beach. She lives in Mystic, Ct., and we steal away to visit her as often as we can during the summer months.

She gets up early and packs the pool bag, the cooler and the chairs. She manages to make enough noise to wake the dead, all the while peeking into my room many times to be sure she's woken me up.

We feed the kids (if they are with us) and make our way to Misquamicut Beach in Rhode Island. It's only a twenty minute drive, but the beach offers great waves, sea shells and the one thing we treasure; sea glass.

After spreading the towels on the beach and arranging the chairs and coolers, the kids know that K and I will begin our walk.

The fact that we get there right after the rooster crows, ensures that we are probably among the first visitors of the morning. We always begin our stroll smiling and patting ourselves on the back for managing to find the same prime spot every single time we come. (That's cause everyone else is SLEEPING for God's sake.)

We walk with our heads to the sand, managing to follow the line where the freezing cold tide rolls into a paper thin film at the sandy edge of the beach. She's trained my eyes to scan to and fro, all the while searching for a faint glimmer of glass.

We've made these walks hundreds of times over the years. When she lost her dear boy, Sassy and Golden Boy and I made the cold walk that February, desperately searching for some memories to wrap ourselves in. It was the one places we found some comfort...

And yet we come here again, scanning the beach and laughing with each other. We fool ourselves into thinking that all is well with the world, and we do have moments when we believe just that. We continue our quest for sea glass in a sea of comfort and love.

Sassy took a trip to another beach recently to visit her boyfriend.. I sat with her on the floor of the bedroom as she unpacked and shared all of the things she did with him, and his amazing family.

She reached into her suitcase and pulled out a tiny purple package.

"Here, I got this for you. We looked and looked and looked for something, and when I thought I would't find ANYTHING, I saw these, " and she handed the package to me. She smiled a knowing smile, and then turned and continued her unpacking.

I was shocked- because I always insist that they never waste money on any gifts for me when they take little trips. And usually they LISTEN. (That might be the only time they do...)

I carefully unwrapped the package, and held the earrings. I felt tears as I realized what they were.

They were earrings, all right. But they were made of sea glass. Beautiful, imperfect, cloudy sea glass.

Damn. She got me.

Right through the heart, she got me.