When people ask me about where I live, I often describe it as someplace the Brady Bunch would have stayed if they had done a Very Special Puerto Rican Vacation. Maybe Mike Brady’s architectural firm would have been in town to redesign our building. I am sure they would have picked out this flooring:
His designers would have helped import the art for the lobby:
And I am sure he would have approved of the bright tile work in the party rooms:
Aside from the 70′s feel of our home, I don’t think about Carol, Mike, Marcia, Greg, Jan, Peter, Cyndi, Bobby or Alice very often.
Until this weekend.
On Friday we took a nice long walk along the beach. We checked on the status of the Sea Turtle nests (1 nest has not yet hatched,) we collected rocks and shells, and checked out a beach volleyball tournament. When we turned toward home, I saw what appeared to be a really large shell sticking out of the sand. Grace tried to pick it up, but couldn’t pry it loose. Intrigued, we dug out the sand and instead of a shell, it was a sandy,white encrusted statue. Right from the start we could see that it was a human with out-stretched arms. I joked that we could clean it up, and paint it gold and turn it into a party prize or white elephant gift. Maybe we will discover that we have a valuable treasure, lost at sea for hundreds of years.
A few hours later I questioned our lucky find.
A bath of warm water and vinegar cleaned off the sand and salt crust and this is what has been revealed.
IT is a SHE.
She is 6 1/2 inches tall.
The base is 3 1/2 inches in diameter.
She weighs less than a pound.
You can see the slight lines that are evidence of being cast in a mold.
She is not completely symmetrical; the body has a slight shift and twist to her left.
Here are the disturbing parts.
She has a hole in each hand, with rust around it, almost like a bleeding stigmata.
She also has devil horns.
I don’t know which part disturbs me more. The holes? The horns? The two together?
We are afraid of her.
The children won’t touch her.
We have decided that she shouldn’t live in the house, so she is awaiting her fate on our balcony.
So here’s the big question. What do we do with her?
We are afraid that if we set her out to sea, she will come back.
Should I take it to our Catholic Church?
Do we have a trip to an ancient burial ground in our future?
Should I apply to be on Antique Roadshow?
No major catastrophes so far, but until we make a decision, there will be no surfing, no hula dancing, and I have my eye out for tarantulas.
