Mother's Mussels at El Capitan State Beach

My mother lived most of her life on the beach, for the first eight years in Torremolinos, Spain, and then in Redondo Beach on the Santa Monica Bay through her teens and twenties.



However, her favorite spot in the world was El Capitan State Beach about twenty miles north of Santa Barbara where she raised her four children.



Her extended family decided to say goodbye to her there on Thursday...



...during a sudden break in last week's stormy coastal weather on an afternoon that was almost psychedelically beautiful.



Since it's illegal in the United States to spread cremated ashes except at sea, we decided to pretend to spread her ashes in her favorite grove of trees, and I'm sticking to that story until I die myself.



There were about twenty of us involved that spanned four generations...



...which was appropriate since the lady was about as authentic an Earth Mother as they come.



In those summers in the 1960s, we would show up at the beach around noon, bodysurf all day, and then if my mother was feeling ambitious...



...we would harvest mussels from the rocks at low tide for dinner.