Hindsight

When I fell, I thought nothing of it. I’d fallen before. Some would say I was clumsy, some that I should know better. Being old has its advantages, being steady on ones feet is not one of them.

Some nice young lady helped me up, picked the things that had fallen from my bag from the sidewalk, and placed them in my bag, and handed it to me with a smile. I thanked her for her kindness and sat on a bench by the street to gather my thoughts. We have a lot of benches here, there are a lot of us old reptiles crawling around this beach area in one form or another, and the city would rather we didn’t block traffic by laying all over the place.

Sitting there I could eye the culprit that brought me down. The concrete slab had been pushed upwards, probably by the swelling ground from all the recent rains. At times it seems we are stuck in a proverbial storm that won’t tell us what it wants, but won’t go away.

There is a patch of wavering shade here at least. The old palm doesn’t look like it has much else to do, but doesn’t have any place it’d rather be either. The ocean is gray to day, with lines of white edged waves. The beach is covered in seaweed, broken shells, and the foam they say is toxic to fish and other creatures. The ocean has changed, but then so have I, and everything else.

Thought I’d sit on the bench a while. Nothing to do at home anyway but listen to people on TV or the radio complain about anything and everything. People I believe today make it a habit to drive themselves crazy with things they can’t do anything about, or do nothing about what they can. Like the ocean, the sky, the thought of my house being gone when the ocean gets greedy and decides it wants more, most of the earth it seems isn’t enough.

See that a lot. The irony seems to be that never having enough is why the ocean believes, if its good enough motto for us, why shouldn’t it be good enough for it. 

Sometimes I think I should have stayed up north. But it was so cold, and the snow, and then the summers…rained there too, and the tornadoes, and the river jumping out of its banks and running down the road like a marathon runner in a hurry to get to the sea, where the two of them could cause more problems.

Good to see the sun, but it makes it intolerably hot. Heat bother’s me more than it used to. It ain’t that I’m not used to the humidity; up north you could cut it with a knife too most days. It was the winds that scared me. Had a tree, older than me come down in the backyard. Beautiful old thing, prettiest leaves in the fall, but it made you pay. Had to have the neighbor kid rake them up; kills the grass otherwise, that’s what people say anyway. Don't see how, but then I don't see how about a lot of things these days.

Not many people out today. A man and his dog walking down the beach. You got to keep them tied on the leash things so they can’t run off and scare people. Being tied up must be like getting old, you want to do things, but just can’t; things holding you back.

Little girl coming up the walk. Not like most children today. She’s got clothes on and not just a bathing suit, and those sandal things. I can’t wear them, the ones that hold on to your foot by that thing between the toes. My toes get sore. Rather go barefoot, but then they won’t let you in places if you do that, so better to just wear my slipper things kids got me.

The little girl is dressed like it’s Sunday. Maybe it is Sunday. Don’t much care anymore, no need. One day like the next, even the weather must be getting old, same every day. She stops, looks at me and smiles. Then as unexpected as I could have thought, she sits down next to me. She’s got on a dress like I remember I had once, a long time ago. Has flowers on it, and this lacy stuff around the neck. You don’t see stuff like that anymore. She must be from one of them foreign places where they keep things for customs sake, and stuff like that. 

Then she says, “My name is Gina. You have a name?” I was taken aback. “Why yes,” I tell her. Strangest thing, “my name is Gina too.” She laughs and says, “I thought so. I remember you from before.”

Before, what could she mean by before? We must have met someplace, or she’d seen me somewhere else and remembered. I must admit depending on how I’m feeling, I ain’t easy to forget. “How do you know me? From where?”

She doesn’t answer, just reaches into her small purse, and pulls out some gum. She pulls out two sticks and offers one to me. I don’t like gum. Well it ain’t that I don’t like gum, it just gum don’t like me much. Tends to get tangled in my teeth. But she was so nice to offer I couldn’t refuse. I thank her and then she says, “For what?” I say, "for the gum," and she just laughs. 

“Just paying you back.” Paying me back for what. I don’t remember the girl, although I guess I don’t remember like I used to.

“You don’t remember me do you?” she says, looking me right in the eyes. That is unusual for a child. They usually pretend they can’t see you, like you are already gone, but just too stubborn to believe it.

I had to tell her; “no I don’t remember you.” She then says,  “look into my eyes and tell me what I see.” I had no idea what she was talking about, but I looked.

She has the prettiest eyes. Kind of a Hazel color with what looks like specks of gold scattered about. “Yes” I tell her, “I’m beginning to see.” I remember the eyes. Mine were like that once before the haze came. Now they look like I keep them in a jar of milk when I go to bed. I can’t tell her that though. Kids have nightmares, that kind of stuff. No one should purposely frighten children. They have enough to fear as it is with the oceans getting greedier, and the rains not wanting to quit crying over our plight, her future.

She then points to the sea, “Look!”

Everything has changed. I can see the beautiful blue water reflecting a cloudless sky. The beaches white and clean, but for a few foot prints. I look up and the old palm tree is dancing and waving its fronds at me like it’s saying hello, welcoming me to a new world. Seagulls glide effortlessly on the breeze, a dog runs free into the water barking at the waves. I can feel the girls hand on mine, and feel a peace I’d forgotten existed.

I turned to thank her and she was gone. I don’t remember how long I’d been there. My glasses sat on the bench beside me. The wind has picked up some, bits of frond like green snow falling from the slate gray sky. Cooler, cold again, like I remember in fall when the wind carried that first smell of snow, and your body seemed to shrink.

I looked down the walk and the girl is skipping along as though the sun were shinning, and a soft breeze was ushering her off to some party. I look back at the sea, the white lines, now lined up in rows like frowns heading for the shore.

A siren sounds, supposed to go indoors, bad weather, hurricane, but go indoors? Hide in the closet? Wait? Wait for what, another little girl to show me how lucky I was, am. I got to see an ocean that you weren’t afraid of, a river you wanted to swim in, a sky that made you want to get under it, and breathe in the hope nature had to offer. 

Think I’ll sit a bit longer and see if any more memoires come along. Fun seein what others see, makes you remember the difference between just looking and seeing.