A Dead Sea Chronicle and the Winner of the Giveaway

The chatter that overflowed from the changing room faded as gravity drew us down the sloping wooden ramps to the water. The beach, not quite sand and not quite dirt, yielded beneath our water shoes with small crunches.

I inhaled the salty Dead Sea air deeply, pushing it down into my toes while my daughter arranged her towel near mine under the tent shelter. The sun, exquisitely restrained, still pressed ancient light under every ledge of the soul, warming from the inside out on this crisp day.

We waded in and the kinship with the countless others throughout past millennia who had done the same thing we were doing beckoned me farther. My daughter laughed with her friends as they settled onto their backs, buoyed confidently by the unfailing water.

I knelt in knee deep shallows, pulling up handfuls of the black Dead Sea mud and coating every inch of exposed skin with it. It worked gently with the sun, hardening while softening.

Still clutching the solid salt crystals I had dredged from the bottom with the mud, I sat back and let my feet be pulled upwards until I, too, floated effortlessly on my back, rocked and soothed by the gentle lapping of the water.

Perfection is anywhere you choose to find it.

And the winner of the giveaway from my last post is Amy from Funny is Family. Amy, if you’ll get me the address where you’d like me to send your book, I’ll get it on its way to you. Congratulations!

And here's the dirty aftermath, while trying to get the mud off~