Dollar Saver

Herr Schmidt was a ruddy mountain of a man,
with a thick mustache and thicker German accent.
When we would vacation at the Venice Beach Best Western on the Gulf Coast,
Herr and Frau Schmidt would greet us with wide grins and bear hugs.
My parents, also Schmidts, would practice their German;
Herr and Frau would practice English.
He learned that I liked sand dollars,
so he spent a morning snorkeling the sand bar,
returned to pile sand dollars at my feet.
But they weren't like the ones at the souvenir shop,
life bleached out.
These were brown, furry, sand dollars, alive.
I cried.
We tossed them futilely back into the water,
my brother and I,
hoping it wasn't too late.