I got crapped on this summer at Bethany Beach, Delaware. One of the relatively few seagulls flying over the narrow sandy beach managed to evacuate at the perfect time to hit bull's eye a top the white baseball cap on my head.

I've been seagull slopped before, decades ago in North Carolina on the ferry to Ocracoke Island. Feeding the crowds of gulls was a longstanding tradition on this ferry, and people often brought loafs of old bread and packages of crackers. I knew this and was ready to partake. As the gulls flew in circles, not just dozens but maybe hundreds of them overhead, the likelihood of getting hit by excrement seemed high. And yet that day, of the large group on the ferry, I seemed to be the only one that got hit. In my late teens, this was a catastrophe. The stuff hit my shirt in a gooey mess that I was unable to clean, even working frantically in the "head" with the foamy hand soap and paper towels. I felt disgusting and unpresentable the entire day, counting the hours until I could take the ferry back to the mainland, return to our cottage and change my shirt. My late adolescent self questioned the unfairness of life: why me? Why was I the one to get crapped on?

When I get hit this time, decades later, I removed my baseball cap, shrugged my shoulders, and considered my options, the first being to throw the hat away right then and there, and move on.  I had a plastic bag, though, from buying something on the boardwalk, and I do like this Nike baseball hat, so I stuffed the hat in the bag and took it back to the condo, still unconcerned, not giving one thought this time to what awful karma had put me in line for the bird's duties. Hey, s**t happens. And the condo had a washing machine. What the heck, I'll throw it in there, but I wasn't optimistic. Surprised I was when the hat emerged almost perfectly clean. One would have had to work hard and know where to look to find any trace of the event, and since I'm over 5'8", I doubted there were going to be too many people up above me looking.  Basically, I was back in business, good as new.

I think there's a metaphor for life in there. And I think I'm making progress.

Life is good.