I think I could probably get arrested and prosecuted for my next confession but what the hell – I’m going to make it anyway.

I tend to come home from the beach with pockets full of shells, pebbles and other bits and bobs that I pick up, like the look of and think I’ll find a use for later. Of course they get home with me, get turfed out of the pockets along with a whole load of sand and other stuff, sit on the side in the kitchen for a few weeks then get shoved in a drawer. I’ve got drawers full of bits of rock and shell, most of which I now have no idea where it came from and much less idea of when I found it.

This is in the “sit on the side in the kitchen for a few weeks” stage, coming from the beach at Trebah when we were there a couple of weeks ago.

It’s my little bit of battered beauty, my treasure trove. What I liked about it was that I’d been watching a couple exercising four pretty little spaniels in exactly the spot where I later wandered along and this caught my eye. It’d obviously been there while they were playing but they’d either not noticed how lovely it is or not cared enough to want to cart it home or maybe even felt they shouldn’t pick up a shell off a beach. Who knows?

I like the fact that its imperfections and obviously battered state don’t detract from its beautiful colour, shape and radiant pattern. So, it found its way into the pocket of one of my Spurs fleeces and was pulled out several times on the path back up the hill to show DM and both of my parents in turn. It’s been living on the kitchen table ever since and although I’m sure with a bit more effort, I’d have made a better picture, perhaps this imperfect picture of an imperfectly beautiful thing is fitting.

Now, if I miss my last week of posting, you’ll know I’ve been arrested for stealing a shell from the beach……..

Looking at what I wrote last year, I can honestly say it only got worse!!!!