Eleanor Roosevelt

Last week we were ready to cash-out and give it up—it's tiring and sad picking up other people's stuff, we could get really disheartened...but this week we bring our friends M. and S. who've never been to Kehoe. We are total show-offs, braggin' on our beach like it was a grand-baby. At our house, they toured the "plant" where we wash, sort and figure what to do with all this crap/treasure. They got to see the warehouse/barn where we store our inventory, sorted into bins of shoes, a box-load of the plastic inserts for baseball cap visors, shotgun wads, a bag full of toy soldiers, etc etc. I mean, you think we're gonna throw out the stuff we find? And, BTW exactly where is the "out" as in “throw out.”

At the parking area we are surprised to see A. who has been by Electric Works with his CCA printmaking students for a tour. "Is this really your beach!?" (on the tour I had told the story of our beach project). He had gotten to beach by being lost and just looking for a place he could walk his dog. Kehoe is famous for being one of two beaches where dogs are allowed. He tells the friend he's with our story—he's got it pretty right—he's actually read the blog. (Our hero! He recounted perfectly the story of finding the soldier in the garbage can.)

Sadly, for M. and S., the beach was not the horrible mess we had represented — we made excuses that Kehoe is a fickle mistress not showing us the full glory of the winter-time strew. It hasn't really stormed so far in 2011, The plastic lies buried under wind-blown sand. M. commented—"You know once you start looking there really is a lot." M. and S. have good eyes for the search—good pattern recognition honed as intrepid flea-marketeers. M. really wants to find a toy something and as Judith proclaims the "thing of the day" a yellow toy canoe, eyes are double-pealed. Judith then finds a lighter. The pressure is on.
 

S. finds a comb, the first of two for him, (combs were some of the first objects made from plastic) then Judith finds a soldier. OK, this is serious. Richard finds a soldier. M.'s starting to suspect we brought these from home. The canoe was pretty awesome, but soldiers? A lighter? “How'd you see those things?”

So follows, three of the Seven Deadly's rearing up—pride, avarice, and envy. Judith, sweet as she is, can surprise you getting a gloat-on when it comes to this project. She proffered a closed hand with a smug eyebrow raised—proclaiming her soldier in an opened palm.

M.'s design office is filled with the coolest things, each item carrying a whole story. We know he'd like to have found the canoe last made in the mid-60's by the Bergman Toy Mfg. not far from where Richard grew up in Illinois. The little boat was part of a set that included Indians on the war-path with raised tomahawks. Then M. finds the true “prize of the day,” an ocean-worn figure, enigmatic and eroded. It's evokes the Cycladic figurines from the early Bronze Age. It'd look good mounted on an alabaster cylinder inside museum vitrine. We look closer. No, we think it may be Eleanor Roosevelt.