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Synchronicity


Happening upon a good pairing of book and place is one of my favorite things, just like the right wine with dinner. A good synchronism enhances both the book and the place in which it’s read, but the desire for a good pairing can be creative – or paralyzing - challenge when planning a trip. In this case, it worked out well. I kind of wish I had brought the Origin of Species along with me, because I want to read it and I’m afraid I’m never going to unless in the right place at the right time. Instead, I brought Jim Lynch’s Highest Tide to Shi Shi and though it spent the first day in a tent and then on and around several piles of sand, it was brought out around the campfire Saturday night. I’m not sure we would have been so engaged by the sea, the tides and the story of Mike O’Malley and his tidal finds in the waters of the Puget Sound had I not had to speak up above the roar and slap of the waves, and we not remembered our own tidal pooling efforts that morning.

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