What is it about dolphins? I have encountered them just a handful of times in my life. They are usually playing or chasing a meal just off the beach moving along at a leisurely pace paying no one any attention. When I see them everything stops. I stare and watch like something might happen I do not want to miss. When they disappear my eyes scan the horizon with expectations of where they may resurface and I fear missing the moment when they do.
We watched a sunrise today in Saint Augustine, Florida. Much like the dolphins I have only been audience to a handful of sunrises. Not being an early riser and when I am up that early, watching the sunrise is usually far from my thoughts. But much like encountering the dolphins when I see a sunrise, everything stops. It is a shame I have only seen a few of these sunrises. It would be a shame if I do not make it a priority to see more sunrises before I die. I actually had a few tears fall during this sunrise because of those whom I love not being able to enjoy something so magnificent with us.
During the sunrise a dolphin surfaced and played about 20 feet out into the ocean. The scene was surreal here are two things that command our attention and stop everything we are doing. No thoughts, no bills, no worries, nothing but S and I in that moment. I wondered afterwards what it is about these experiences that strike such a deep emotion in us. My efforts were futile I had no answer it is just one of those things.
We are from the Midwest and both were raised there. My whole experience with vacationing as a child was always going to visit relatives. Namely staying at Grandma and Grandpas for the summer. But one-summer things were different because it was the only summer we ever went on vacation to somewhere other than one of our relative’s homes.
The stars aligned and my life would be forever changed. My Aunt Dorothy and Uncle Raymond lived in Tallahassee, Florida and extended an invite to my family to come and stay for a few days on the way to Mickey’s place. I was 12 years old during the summer of 1984 and was stuck in the back of a brand new station wagon, that my dad was way to proud of, for the whole trip. We had to turn the a/c off to get up the mountains of Tennessee. I had no idea what I was going to see or what we were going to do in Florida. The parents kept me in the dark for some reason. Mostly because I was a hellion of a child I suppose.
When we arrived at my Aunt and Uncles house, who were my Aunt and Uncle by default. You see in my family like everyone else’s families in the Midwest if you are not Mom, Dad, Grandma or Grandpa, then you are Aunt and Uncle by default. Anyway their house was one of those homes that children do not often visit and therefore are very uncomfortable for any child much like S’s moms house. I explored their home like it was another planet. There were seashells everywhere, big conchs, starfish, oddities I had never seen before. I was scared and interested at the same time. We sat down to dinner and I could tell they really wanted to expose us to their world. We had Brunswick stew, smoked mullet and some kind of dish I refused. The only shrimp I had ever seen was the popcorn shrimp at Bonanza back home after church. The Brunswick stew smelled horrible but the fish was really good. They sat around and talked about this and that, the way families did back then, and soon it was time to go to bed. Dorothy led me to the room I was to stay in which excited me that I was getting a room to myself. She got me settled and tucked me in and asked if I was ok. OK? I was great, I was so excited for the next day to start, and I wanted to go right to sleep. As she walked out of the room she turned to turn off the light and said to me, “You know that bed is the bed your Great Grandma Died in!” Holy shit I couldn’t believe the words that I had just heard. I was lying where my great grandma died. What kind of woman tells that to an 12-year-old boy? Needless to say sleep did not come easy that night.
Dorothy and Raymond had a surprise up their sleeve. You see they owned a house on St. Georges Island about an hour away from their house. We were going to stay there a few days before going to Mickey’s. No way! I was so stoked I didn’t know what to expect. I had never seen the ocean; the closest thing for me was a large lake. The drive there was boring until we went over the intercoastal and I could see everything from the top of the bridge. We pulled into a little beach house about a block off the beach it was up on stilts. Again this was all new to me. We went in and the house which was not children friendly but there was a pong video game that got me through a rainy day. We unpacked and immediately walked down to the beach. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I have never felt so small in my 12 years of life as I did next to that ocean. We went back to the house to get settled in so we could do some real beach time. Ants of course bit me and when I declared the ants were biting me I was told I was a liar by my mother until she got bit by the ants. That was awesome it felt so good to have retribution. If I could have, I would have personally thanked each of those ants for biting her.
The first time in the Gulf of Mexico for my family and me we had a couple of cheap floats. The waves were big, the ocean was big, and it was all so big. I was floating around and a wave caught me and off I went. What the hell just happened? That was awesome. For the rest of the day my dad and I rode the waves until we couldn’t stand. We were so sunburn and beat that by today’s standards the DCFS would have taken me away and put me in foster care. It was one of the best days of my life. During our stay there I was introduced to de-veining shrimp, homemade ice cream and how the dead sleep. The next evening we went to feed the seagulls, by the way only tourists feed the seagulls and there is a reason. One of the seagulls relieved themselves on my head and off I went back to the house to shower immediately, I was so upset to have been crapped on. Not until later was I told that being crapped on is good luck. (If being crapped on is good luck then my family is the luckiest sonsabitchs on the planet) My family must have had a good laugh I know I would have laughed up a storm to see that. I don’t ever remember a time before or after that when my family was as happy as they were there along the shores of the ocean. On our last day when most children would be excited to go to Disneyland I was bummed. I begged my father to drive us past the beach one last time before we left and he did. We were of course leaving real early in the morning because we are Midwesterners and that’s what we do, “we leave early.” What did we see? There they were playing, swimming here and there. I can’t remember how many there were but there was no doubt they were dolphins. Right there I could almost touch them, they were that close. When Dad said lets go I fell apart. I got in the car crying and looking back at the ocean trying to take it all in and fighting the thought that I may never see the ocean again. The rest of the trip sucked; to be honest I don’t remember much of it at all. I do remember the fear of never returning to Florida or to the ocean.
Today as I write this I have the same fear as I did when I was a 12-year-old boy. I now fear never living back on the Gulf of Mexico. I lived on the Gulf for years and moved away thinking it would be easy to return but it’s not easy to just go back, life happens. My family watched many people come to Pensacola beach and on their last day do the same thing my family did in 1984. They would come to the beach and say good-bye. I wonder if those kids feel the same way I did? For now I feel like that little boy and I am scared we might not make it back. Again I am so small……
