Category Archives: Shoes (on the beach)

Flip-Flop in the Sand

Leave a reply

S30A0966

I’m not 100% sure that this zori was abandoned. It looks like someone may have thrown it or kicked it off as he ran out of the water.

S30A0962

Its mate, however, like its owner, was nowhere to be found.

Since March, I’ve been to the lakefront fifteen times… yet I’ve found only two shoes or parts of shoes.

The weather has been very cool, especially right at the lake. Perhaps it’s been too cold for people to remove their shoes, throw them around, or leave them behind.

Sole #6

Leave a reply

The first shoe of the season is part of a sole. It is very degraded and I expect it is left over from last year.

I had to flip it over to be sure what it was. You can see little perforations around the edge that indicate that it is part of a shoe.

S30A0938

I’m not really sure if it is from an outer sole or an inner sole.

I also came across this, which does seem recent:

S30A0940

And here’s what the beach looks like right now, in one of the less littered areas. It really was a beautiful day.

S30A0941c

Photographed April 2, 2015

Clog: Eight Days Later

Leave a reply

Here’s the clog of the Ancient Mariner, eight days later.

S30A0847

The dead bird is gone, or at least moved.

S30A0848

This particular beach has been exceptionally filthy this year. These two weeks that the clog was here were the filthiest days so far on the filthiest beach: densely strewn with plastic, dead birds, boat parts, and junk of every imagining.

This year I have felt very sad about the amount of plastic. From earlier in the year:

S30A0807

It makes me think about microplastic pollution. Plastic doesn’t disappear, it just breaks down into tinier pieces. The tiny pieces attract toxins and are eaten by birds and sea creatures. Even if we don’t eat these creatures, we drink this water.

Research is being done on the Great Lakes by the 5 Gyres Institute, an organization dedicated to eliminating plastic pollution in the oceans. Please support them.

Plastic debris photographed August 28, 2014
Clog photographed October 3, 2014

The Shoe of the Ancient Mariner

1 Reply

S30A0831

“God save thee, Ancient Mariner! from the fiends that plague thee thus!
Why lookst thou so?”

“With my crossbow
I SHOT THE ALBATROSS!”

S30A0833

“I closed my lids, and kept them close,
And the balls like pulses beat;
For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky
Lay dead like a load on my weary eye,
And the dead were at my feet.”

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Photographed September 25, 2014