It is often said they you can experience hell on earth. When I was 14 years old, I went to see Jaws on the Friday night it opened. In that same summer my mother had been granted use of her employer’s condo in Ft. Lauderdale for one week. We arrived one day after my dreams of being an oceanographer were dashed by the wailing and gnashing of teeth. I don’t think Hell should be forever, but it would not bother me a bit if Steven Spielberg (The director of Jaws) and Peter Benchley (the author of Jaws) sat in a carnival dunk tank full of sharks for a 100 years. We would all get to throw copies of the book and old VHS tapes at the bullseye.
To this day I still cannot imagine anything more terrifying than that first day in the water. There is nothing else to do on that stretch of beach but go in the water, especially when it is 95 degrees in the shade. As soon as my toes hit the ocean, all I heard was the theme song from the movie beating through my bones. I was convinced that I would be chewed and thrown around like a dog's rope toy. Like all the girls in 9th grade, I prayed the sharks would find a skinny, pimply, white perogie looking teenager unattractive. This torture when on for days. It climbed to its peak when a swimmer a mile from us was bitten on the leg by a shark and nearly bled out. He was in the hospital and I was in Hell. It was like meeting the demons in the flaming pit as they handed out pitchforks while asking... "Would you like your pitch fork supersized?" The water is not clear in Ft. Lauderdale and like the bullet you don’t hear coming, a shark can leisurely swim to you. That experience was so scarring that, to this day, I feel I only narrowly avoided my destiny of being eaten. I still think that is how I am going to leave this earth. This is not a phobia; this is a vision of the future.
I have always imagined the Titanic sinking, the people in the freezing water, the cracking sounds, and the band that continued to play. I can see two sharks bobbing with their heads above the water and the one says to the other “Hey listen, they’re playing our song!” I imagine that several different species of sharks fed on cold cuts for days. Now don’t get all hot and bothered. The sinking took place 100 years ago; it is about time it is opened for humor. I am not writing about Columbine or the World Trade Center for heaven's sake. I still have never been able to come up with a Lincoln or Kennedy joke either, so for those sensitive ones out there, we have reached the high water mark.
I have always loved whales, killer whales in particular. Now what a bummer of a name. I mean we all kill something when we eat. Every one of us and everything that is alive so how they got to grab the title of killer, I am not sure. I always imagined a father killer whale teaching his little one about hunting. “Now, remember son, if the seal is broke, don’t open it”. I am always surprised when these beautiful beasties don’t eat their trainers at Sea Parks. I would eat anyone that kept me in a cement prison, whether I was hungry or not. I think it is horrible when a trainer gets hurt or killed. I have no doubt that they love these animals and always want them to be treated extremely well. I am just never surprised is all, I don’t think anyone is.
There is an estimate that 10 % of all plastic ends up in the ocean. Plastic bags look like jelly fish so Sperm Whales eat them. It is not enough that the book Moby Dick helped push these animals to the brink of extinction but now the question at the grocery store “Paper or Plastic” can contribute to the death of marine mammals.
I don’t know if you believe in evolution or not and it really doesn’t matter to me if you do but, let me suggest this…The mammals that took to the water had a pretty good idea of what was coming. They saw the future of the naked ape that would run around with spears and wipe out every animal it could. They took to the water as a formal retreat and were not too anxious to look back to shore. The penguins went to Antartica to get away. They even traded in their wings so on impulse they would not fly back.I am sure the invention of the diesel engine was a sad day for the entire ocean. What we have heard for the last 40 years as wonderful whale songs, which can travel thousands of miles, are actually nothing more than cries of mourning. It is a sad memory song of a peaceful life that is being taken away by books, movies and ignorance.
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