the first starfish i see

I've only been to the ocean seven times in my life. That's pretty bad considering I just live a few hours from the coast and the ocean is so magnificent. Since I don't get there very often, I'm easily impressed. Today, I was awed by the starfish.

At low tide, the ocean life came to the surface and I got a better view of what's normally just below the surface. There's just so much life there and the ocean has such an easy time concealing it, it makes me wonder two opposing thoughts at the first time. Initially, I began to wonder how we as a species could be so careless with what we dump into the ocean. Just because we can't see the life that's there, we are extra-insensitive to it. Then I wonder how much damage we can really do. I mean, the ocean is huge. I have no doubt that man has taken a significant toll on ocean life but it will be here LONG after we're gone. The latter thought is very comforting.

Back to the ocean life. Starfish look so amazing when they're alive. It's crazy to think that something that is that inanimate could be an animal. We saw close to a dozen of these creatures too and some sea urchins, mollusks and clams as well. There were sea gulls and albatrosses everywhere and a herd of sea lions were sunning themselves on the opposite shore of the bay. Pretty damn magnificent.