The Shells on the Beach

I find the indictment of James Comey over a social media photo of seashells on the beach to be a fascinating example of how humans are always interpreting language through the lens of what they believe to be true.

The seashells were arranged in the numbers 86 47.

The indictment suggests that this was a call for violence against the 47th President of the United States. To “86” someone can imply violence.

James Comey says his interpretation of “86” is to remove something. It is slang frequently used in restaurants, meaning to refuse service or to throw something out. Once he realized that it could be interpreted as violent, he removed the post and apologized, stating that he opposes all forms of violence.

His interpretation of the message was different from the one the Justice Department assigned to it.

This entire case is so human.

We are always interpreting language through our own lens, and then arguing with others because they see it differently.

If we look at 86 47 through the lens of numerology, we see something completely different.

If you break down the number 86:

8 + 6 = 14 1 + 4 = 5

So 86 carries the energy of 5, which is associated with change, freedom, disruption of the old, and transition.

Then number 47:

4 + 7 = 11

11 is considered a master number associated with intuition, higher awareness, insight, and spiritual illumination.

If we take it down further:

1 + 1 = 2

Which symbolizes harmony, relationship, and balance.

Together, 86 47 in a numerology lens could read as:

Change (5) + Awakening (11)

Or:

Disruption can lead us to insight. We are in a transition toward higher awareness.

What if the person who placed those shells on the beach was a numerologist?

Now the message isn’t pointing toward political meaning at all, but toward transformation, intuition, and awakening.

We could choose this interpretation.

And how would our response be different?

Humans communicate through language, which always carries a layer of interpretation, which is very different from how animals communicate. For us, everything has meaning.

But language has also created a layer that separates us from each other. Because we aren’t feeling what someone else is trying to convey, we are interpreting it.

I think of how my dog Bert would respond if he saw those same shells on the beach.

Bert would see the shells, sniff them, pee on them, and move on.

He meets what’s there, responds if it matters to him, and then he’s done.

He doesn’t linger over the narrative. His identity isn’t wrapped around their meaning.

That doesn’t make Bert better in some moral sense.

But he helps me see how human it is to assign meaning to everything, and the problems that can develop when we get stuck in our interpretation without being able to see other possibilities.

Because we don’t just interpret. We hold the interpretation. We defend it. And we have difficulty letting it go.

But when we can see that we are choosing our interpretation, we can also change it.

And maybe this is the message of the shells on the beach.