“Sweetie, do you know what that is?”

No response.

“Look at that bird! You know what they call it?”

Still no response.

“It’s a seagull!”

The youngster remains as mute as an Easter Island moai statue.

“Do you know why they call it a seagull?”

Silence.

“It’s called a seagull because we’re at the sea! Sea gull! The sea! Sea gull! The sea! If we were somewhere else they’d just call it a gull!”

I gnash my teeth. We are at the beach. The family whose father professes ornithological expertise is 10 feet away.

I came to sit on a towel and read, and try to remember what it was like to be a young parent. Could I have been that overbearing?

I open my book but am distracted by the father’s nonstop dissertation.

“Look! There’s another seagull! And another!”

“Cookie,” the little boy replies. Finally, he speaks!

Mom springs into action and reaches into a canvas tote containing the entire Hostess and Frito lines of snacks.

Dad intercedes.

“Go wash your hands in the water before you eat. Get the sand off …”

“Cookie!”

“First you have to wash your hands.”

“Cookie!”

“Your hands are dirty!”

A fourth member of the family, a slightly older girl, runs breathlessly forward and interrupts the standoff.

“Mommy! Daddy! Look! I caught a crab!”

“A crab! Where did you catch a crab?”

“It was in the water! Look!” She tilts her plastic bucket so the others can observe.

“Wow! A crab! I can’t believe you caught a crab! Watch out for his claws! He’ll bite you!”

“He was right there where the waves come in. I scooped him up!”

“Let the crab alone for now. Don’t bother him. You don’t want him to pinch you.”

She leaves the hapless creature in the bucket and starts building a sand castle while her brother toddles off to the water to rinse his hands.

The boy returns shortly to eat his cookie while the girl continues building her castle.

I’m tempted to chime in, “Do you know why they call it a sand castle? It’s a castle, made of sand! Sand! Castle!” but hold my tongue.

A few minutes later Mom speaks.

“Anybody need to go potty?”

Silence.

“Who needs to use the potty?”

No reaction.

“Potty?”

Third time’s the charm. The kids squirm and Dad issues a directive.

“OK, let’s go. Grab your toys …”

“Daddy, I can’t find my crab.”

“Don’t worry about the crab. He’s probably in the sand somewhere.”

The girl continues searching, letting the grains filter through her fingers, but Dad is getting impatient.

“Come on. It’s getting late.”

The girl shrugs. Oh well, it’s only a crab.

Lugging towels, chairs, plastic buckets and shovels, the family shuffles off toward the parking lot.

We depart a few minutes later. I half-heartedly peer in the sand for the crab. The tide is out and the water is now at least 50 yards away. For a tiny crustacean it might as well be the Gobi Desert.

A seagull will probably find it – to the Dad, I’m sure, if he gave it a second thought, simply the circle of life.

To keep from slipping deeper into a funk I tell myself that maybe when the girl is older she’ll realize the world would be a much better place if people allowed other creatures to stay in their own homes.

Also, with luck, maybe her brother would simply be able to enjoy watching in silence as a gull soars above the waves.