I found this piece of driftwood on the beach in Ocean City. The contast of the dark wood against the bright white sand caught my eye immediately. After picking up the wood I noticed the weathered quality it had. This was most likely from being tossed around out at sea or at the shoreline. Its texture had been smoothed out from the waves and sand and it was now very light and buoyant, almost like cork. The unknown story of this driftwood intrigued me. Such as how did it end up here? Where was it originally? How long was it out at sea? These unanswered questions increased my attention towards this lone piece of driftwood as I searched for a hint to its story. My dad has one very large piece of driftwood from a hurricane that ripped through the Ocean City boardwalk. The fact that this piece of wood has such a historical story attached to it gives it an almost majestic quality to it. No longer is it thought of as just an old water rot piece of wood but it is rather personified by its journey. My dad also collects large pieces of driftwood and uses them as materials to make something else like a sculpture. He is currently working on making a sailboat. He has collected one piece from where my sister lives in East Hampton, NY and another from where we live in the summer in Bethany Beach, DE. In this one sailboat sculpture two worlds converge. Each piece of wood tells its own story of where it was found as well as its own unknown journey. Who knows maybe these two pieces of wood who were found so far away from one another could have at one point crossed paths or even started off as one. In the end although yes driftwood is just an old piece of water rot wood it's story and its ability to become something else deserves our attention.
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