By Angie Wagner Tales from the crib
LAGUNA BEACH There’s something we Wagners have had to learn to accept. It started long ago, and extends into many aspects of our lives.
We have to do everything twice. When we buy something, usually a big product, we know it most likely is going to have to be returned for being broken or damaged. I know it sounds crazy, but it’s true.
Example: When we unwrapped a table and chair set for our patio, we noticed a large scratch across the top. We returned it, grabbed another and... the same thing happened. Only this time when we returned it, they didn’t have any more.
We found a flaw in the new carpet. After it was ripped up, we were told that color was no longer available.
We bought a new fax machine that didn’t work. My daughter’s doll house was missing a part on Christmas Day.
A packet of screws for a shelf is missing one.
See what I mean? We call it just being a Wagner. Which brings me to our lovely day at the beach. We had decided to spend Labor Day weekend in Laguna Beach, Calif., with our girls and my parents.
We loaded up with towels, chairs, snacks and umbrellas and headed down to the beach. I packed the baby’s stroller with all these things and attempted to push it in the sand so it would be easier than carrying everything.
My toddler, husband and father were playing in the water while my mother and I sat in the beach chairs with the baby nearby.
We were way up on the sand, nowhere near where the tide was hitting.
Then I noticed the waves were getting awfully big. No one else seemed concerned, though, and the surfers were loving it.
All of a sudden, I noticed water coming toward us. It happened so fast we didn’t have time to move. But in another way, it was like a car wreck, where you see it happening before it happens but can’t do anything about it.
The water hit us with force and swallowed us up to our necks. As the wave moved, it swept up sand and rolled it over us and on up the beach.
I start yelling for the baby because at this point, I can’t see anything. All I know is that a mighty big wave came our way and I can’t see her.
She could be halfway up the beach by now.
She’s crying, but luckily for her, she has good survival skills from all those times she falls down. So much for a nice, quiet day at the beach.
My toddler informed me she just wanted to go back home because she doesn’t like the big waves.
I had so much sand on me and in my mouth I don’t argue.
My family now refers to this incident as the mini-tsunami.
I looked up and down the beach and realized that strange wave just hit pockets of people. The people on either side of us did-n’t even get wet or have sand slammed in their face.
But, of course we did! It just goes along with being a Wagner.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 18, 2007. Read the original PDF.