Today would have been my grandfather’s 113th birthday. I’ve written about him on this day for the past two years, and I thought it would be nice to keep up the tradition.
My previous birthday posts about Grandpa:
Eleventy-First, with Memories | J.R. Johnson
My grandparents lived in Chicago for most of my life but when they retired they became snowbirds, the kind that fly south for the winter. Later, they moved down there permanently. My grandfather walked the beaches south of Cape Canaveral and found, among other things, the bleached white skeletons of Echinarachnius parma, otherwise known as sand dollars.
I saw live sand dollars for the first time on our recent visit to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. They resemble their skeletons only in shape, and even that is unexpectedly flipped upright. Check out the images in the article below.
9 Fascinating Facts About Sand Dollars
The sand dollar—or “sea biscuit,” or “sand cake,” in other parts of the world—is purple and hairy in its prime.
Grandpa used to collect sand dollars and give them to us kids, a tiny piece of a magical, tropical land far to the south.
I still keep one on my bookshelf.
Happy birthday, Grandpa.
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J.R. Johnson 
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