It's just tiny rocks ...

Sand.

Now before I go totally off the deep end, let me set the record straight. I love walking on the beach. The beach is sand. If A=B and B=C, then A=C. So you'd think I love sand.

Well, if it would stay on the beach, perhaps. But it doesn't. And it doesn't in spades.

Perhaps it's a childhood trauma. I do remember being caught up in a particularly heavy surf and having my rear end drug through the sand, coming up with enough inside the lining of my swimsuit to level out the greens of a small golf course. Even at that tender age, I knew what uncomfortable meant when you're dealing with the area around the Gentiles, and SAND was certainly not a friend.

We spent about two hours at the beach today. My children seemed to have no problem with the fact that they were covered head to toe in the granular stuff. Now mind you, they didn't want to walk back to the car in it, but that's beyond the point.

I had been squatting with my back to the Gulf of Mexico building my sand resort ... one of those drizzle castles with a moat and then a retaining wall and another moat to fend off the raging sea. Unbeknownst to me, with each wave bashing into my posterior, tablespoons of the sugary stuff were depositing themselves inside my board shorts. Layering themselves between the outer shell and the lining. Crikey.

I got up (which took a second or two) and for a minute, I was alarmed. I thought I had my cell phone and that it had fallen out of my pocket into the leg of my board shorts. "No, that can't be. I don't have pockets." Plus, it was on both sides, on the backs of my thighs.

Arrgh ... you guessed it.

So I waded out into the surf, shaking the bottom of my board shorts trying to free myself from the grit. Perhaps no one was watching. Yeah, right ... EVERYBODY does a little people-watching on the beach. Don't say you haven't, because you have. And especially white pasty males shaking their legs in unnatural ways in the green surf.

After the bizarre water dance, I thought I had it all removed, and we set out on our journey to cross the blazing noonday Sahara back to the beachside showers to rinse off. Like a dribbling little public beach shower really gets it all. Nope. Especially when it's in your hair.

We get back to my in-laws house and the kids hit the showers. Had I been crafty enough, I could have used the sand that came off of them to make the concrete for our new addition's foundation. Why weren't they uncomfortable??? They sat in that stuff all the way from the beach to the house! A 20-minute ride! I would have been going bonkers.

How is it that sand can get in places where other natural resources can't? Apparently I had gotten into it more than I realized. You know you're cursed by the sand gods if you take a potty break and you pass sand.

So I hit the showers to rid once and for all (until the next beach trip) these microscopic boulders plaguing my crevices. Down the drain they went, perhaps on their way back to the sea. Farewell and good riddance.

And don't even get me started on sunscreen ...