must have kept a piece of the shell. Maybe as a keepsake. Maybe just because he forgot it was in his pocket. Maybe because he’s a teenage boy and his floor is a black hole where objects go to disappear.
I had spiraled from “weird fragment” to “drugs” to “my son is hiding something terrible” in less than five minutes. The truth was a hermit crab.
I wanted to be angry at myself for jumping to conclusions. But mostly, I felt relieved. And a little silly. And deeply, profoundly grateful.
The Spiral (What Happened in My Head)
Let me walk you through the dark path my imagination took.
The discovery: I saw something I didn’t recognize. My brain flagged it as “unknown.” And because I’m a parent, my brain’s default setting is “danger.”
The possibilities: Within seconds, I cycled through a dozen alarming explanations. Drugs. Vaping residue. Pills crushed up
