Seaweed Queen

I have always been a seaweed queen. When I was a child I would crouch down over tidal pools, push the algae aside and watch for minnows. I was never afraid of the slime green vegetation. When the tide moved in it was fun to watch the long, dark, bumpy strands of seaweed sway along the shore. To me, it was a forest of brown dancing under the waves. Mermaids hair as they hid among the rocks just out of reach. On luckier days after hurricanes giant strings of leafy kelp would wash up onto the beach and suddenly my friends and I had skirts from the sea. Wet and slimy, wrapped around our bodies and staining our clothes. We were queens of the ocean come ashore to live in landlocked exile. My imagination took me to an underwater world that continues to fascinate me to this day.
When I grew older (and bolder) I learned seaweed was actually edible and began drying it as a kind of vegetarian beef jerky. Adding it to my diet of raw periwinkles and mussels, crab apples, sour clover, and blackberries I ate like royalty foraging all day long.

I’ve since stopped watching for mermaids. I no longer wear kelp for fashion. I’ve lost the taste for the salty sea. But, I will always, always be a seaweed queen.