Beach glass found in the surf wash near the small Mexican town of Sayulita.
Their light shines brightest when the sun is weakest.
The soft, gleaming glow of beach glass -- the rounded, weathered pebbles of glass from the sandy, tumbling surf -- catches the eye when the Mexican sun is low in the sky. The day's first beams of sun filter through the palm trees along a beach near the tiny town of Sayulita, and tiny, pitted chunks of lime green, clear, amber and kelly green glass softly glisten as the wave wash foams over the sand.
The morning air is thick and balmy -- and the beach glass is easiest to spot when the sun is low in the sky.
The oldest, most weathered pieces -- once sharp, dangerous shards from broken bottles -- are soft and smooth in the hand, and they often find their way into my pocket.
I most often find beach glass as I wander along the beach with a fishing rod in my hand or a surfboard under my arm. My friends and family laugh at my slow, clumsy progress down the beach, as I often stop to poke through the thin line of sticks, shells, stones and bottle caps that mark the high point of the night's high tide.
I'm out early to ride waves -- or cast for fish if the waves are too messy, too small or too big. But that light -- reflecting off the worn glass -- always catches my eye. The early morning is a time of feeding fish, glassy waves and beach glass. Few people are up and about at such an early hour, but it is the best time of day.
So, I wander and slog through the sand, with one eye on the waves and another scanning for light glowing in glass.
As I understand it, glass is made from melting sand, soda and lime in a furnace that shimmers at 1,500 degrees. Glass is everywhere in our world, and it seems like much of it -- especially in the form of soda and beer bottles -- ends up in the ocean. A broken bottle washing up a beach or tumbling in the bottom currents is an ugly thing, and the world would be a better place if more humans put their glass in the recycling bin.
But the endless, tireless churn of surf and sand turn trash into treasure. Bottles are broken into tiny pieces and smoothed into beauty. Ugly, sharp shards are scoured into cloudy, rounded treasures. Beach glass is really glass slowly turning back into sand. If we pick up a piece and slip it into a pocket, we interrupt that miracle.
And beach sand is a minor miracle. The natural world transforms human ugliness into simple beauty, and that is a miracle in my eyes.
So, I get up with the sun and wander the beaches near this small fishing and surfing town an hour or so north of the bustling, brassy tourist city of Puerto Vallarta and look for jack Crevalle or roosterfish boiling on bait, waves to surf -- or those little chunks of glowing light.
In an hour or two, the hot Mexican sun will climb above the hills that overlook this beautiful coastline -- and the hot rays will hammer the sand.
In a few days, a big, shining jet will carry me away from these wonderful beaches, but I'll have a few chunks of smooth, sandblasted, wave-washed glass pebbles in my duffle. When I get home, I'll put them into a glass jar, which holds the beach glass I've found during my travels to beaches from British Columbia south to Costa Rica.
I collected a piece or two of that glass during my childhood in Southern California. Much of it came from Mexico. At least one piece or two were plucked from a remote beach in Costa Rica, where iguanas scuttled through the beachside jungle and howler monkeys rattled through the trees.
I don't remember where each piece caught my eye, but I'm pretty sure most of them were found when the sun is weak and the day in new -- or very, very old.
