NOT MY THING

The white clouds are flat and grey on the bottom. They look like they are just about ready to take a nice cool swim in the Atlantic Ocean. Small, low, almost tender waves roll onto the clean tan beach. It’s pocked with footprints, some coming towards me, some going to meet the clouds. How did Columbus, Vespucci keep their ships afloat, going, going like the Energizer battery? I swear it looks like over the horizon the ocean will drop into a huge hole and will create the largest roaring waterfall on earth. The sun, the sand, are on fire but the breeze blows and cools the shade where the palm trees line the Alameda.

I sit in the semi-comfort under a shaded palm thatched hut, listening to chit chat in Spanish, crying babies. For sure the sun’s reflected rays are going to get me no matter which direction I look so I try not to castigate myself for being here. The sun and I will reflect together for a short while.

Hopeful swimmers carry colorful buckets and shovels for their kids to amuse themselves while they wade out a little and plop into the chilly water. Let them. I’ll stay dry and sand free. Coming towards me, each carrying a folded aluminum chair, is a couple who look happy, babble in French while I believe their dark skin says Mexican or perhaps Haitians. They lean their chairs against my table and sit opposite me. We talk and I learn they are Caucasian from NY, vacationing in FL for the ‘season.’ Every day they are at the beach for hours. Not only will they have dried up, cracked skin, coarse hair, before the ‘season’ is over, they will be accepted in Harlem as one of their own. And before long, may be patients at the oncology dept of Sinai Hospital.

Excitement, people running to the water’s edge. I sit where I am.A baby, barely toddling, squirmed away from her mother who was reading a child care magazine. The mother finally looked up and the baby was floating, face down, just a few feet out in the water. A swimmer was about to step onto the beach, saw the baby, carried him in and started careful, light touch resuscitation. It worked. The gathered crowd applauded. The careless mother packed up her book, , her miscellaneous items, the baby’s water bottle, some towels, and without bothering to put on her bathing suit cover, managed to carry the baby too, and left. Good riddance.

Along the paved path tall palm trees stand like soldiers on parade. Their fronds shade the street not the beach, yet one after another I see people sitting under them without noticing the sun moved away long ago. What they may enjoy is the tickle of black ants running up their legs. I wouldn’t and so I sit under the palm thatched hut, noticing, watching others, some who watch me.

Mother’s loudly instruct their kids to use the outside shower, ‘Get all the sand off your feet. Dry them before you put your shoes on.’ I am close to the shower and enjoy the kids glee and splashing. That is interrupted by a lady ( I use the term loosely) about 55, no less than 20 lbs. overweight, wearing a bikini three sizes too small. She drinks from a fountain, keeping it running with her left hand, as she uses her right one to remove the thong from her crack. If I were her husband, I’d have cracked her.

A few passersby glance at me and must wonder what I am writing, but don’t ask. I wonder, too, what am I writing, why am I here. The narrow attractive wooden bench is hard. So is the table that gives me no comfort at all. The hands on my watch seem glued in place. 40 more minutes left before I can walk to my parked car to meet my son who has been swimming and getting sun burned for an hour. He is right on the time he said he’d be back.

Hopefully my sigh is unheard and my joy is invisibly inside of me.