The pain in the pit of the stomach soon eased, followed by solid warmth. The sandwiches tasted good in spite of their lack of freshness or quality. Exotic places should be places of sumptuous feasts of all kinds of culinary delights. The reality of the situation was certainly far from the truth.
He glanced at his watch. The time was nearly at hand when the Earth would interpose itself entirely between the sun and moon. Mother Earth was in complete control of the heavens for an eternally short time; Mother Earth dictating what terrestrial mortals may see, striking fear, inspiring awe, demanding attention; Mother Earth reminding her children that she must never be ignored. He removed his watch and let it drop onto the sand. Now was a time to forget about time. Attention was demanded and the watch was a shackle to be broken. Tonight would be a moment to always remember.
Then, there was a feeling he could not begin to describe. There was something momentous about to happen and it was not in the sky. He tried shaking the feeling off but could not. The moon glared down on his brow demanding his undivided attention. A shiver coursed through his body like an epileptic seizure. He had many similar episodes throughout his life. It was a family gift to predict what was to come or at least to detect imminent change. More often than not, the feeling proved true. He prayed what was to come would solve his problems. He knew however he never had any control of the future portended to come.
The stars in the sky were washed away in Luna’s brilliance; she dominated the sky. Luna swept lazily across the sky apparently unaware of her date with Mother Earth’s shadow. More often than not, Luna escaped eclipse and remained dominant. Whether waxing gibbous or waning gibbous, Luna’s place was supreme. Mother Earth reminded her child how dependent she was. Blocking Father Sun’s radiant light proved who controlled what and whom.
Many years ago he had watched the stars and moon from a place a half a world away. In those tropical nights so long ago he and Bill had wasted endless hours planning for a future that never came. The future was as plain as the pattern of constellations. Only by brute force of imagination was it possible to discern the days to come. It was the here and now they should have paid attention not the unknown future. Life is a perpetual continuum of individual lives. Each life by itself is meaningless. Taken as a whole, life becomes understandable. That understanding may offend the senses and bruise the ego but it remains an unalterable truth. He wished he could recover just one balmy night he and Bill had shared, to laugh and play, to rejoice with life. Tears began welling up in his eyes again.
He looked continuously at the moon, drying his eyes on the edge of his T-shirt. The moment was near. The ocean became calm and flattened. Even the wind disappeared, surrounding him in an ever deepening silence. Another bone shaking chill shook his soul. There was joy and fear mixed into an alloy of excitement. The halo of the moon detectably changed. First, it was an impression, followed by proven event. He hesitated looking through the telescope afraid he would miss something. He stood mesmerized as Mother Earth’s shadow nibbled at Luna’s golden crown. Second by second an ever larger slice was carved away. Luna was disappearing.
The tension between mother and daughter grew stronger with each passing moment. He thought he could feel the intrinsic gravitational pull between two celestial bodies. He almost felt the tide roll in and wondered if he could be inundated if it really happened. The stars waited patiently to reappear.
And the earth moved. Eons of pent-up forces were suddenly released in a massive shift of the ocean floor. Compared to the depth of the water the change to the surface appeared as a mere ripple. And this ripple raced away in the stealth of the night, moving wavelike nearly as fast as a 747 passing overhead. Without further ado the ocean undulated in obedience to physical law.
The quake had lasted only a few seconds and remained unrecognized by him. Thousands of miles away, alerts were sounded by geologists predicting danger from the propagated wave. To this danger, he remained perfectly ignorant. And had he known there was nothing he could do to stop it.
The Earth’s umbra continued covering more of the lunar surface. The stars on the darkening side twinkled into view. The shadows all around continuously changed their character. Everything was in a surreal flux. Terrestrial reality was supplanted by an ethereal one.
“Eeee,” he exhaled in appreciation. He wondered how many other mortals like he watched who could appreciate what was happening above or how many others had their eyes fixed upward seeing what he saw. Alone as he was, he could not conceive anyone else experiencing what he felt.
When the halfway point was passed, the darkness quickened. The stars demanded preeminence in the firmament. The time was arriving for total extinction of the moon’s presence. The stars twinkled in delight awaiting their moment of victory.
He had planned long ago to photograph any eclipse he could. With the loss of Bill there was no reason to record anything. Memories were meant to share between like souls who had seen and felt the same things. The image of Bill standing beside him burned heavy on his heart. He sighed sadly, shaking his head. The first eclipse he had ever witnessed they were together as kids camping out on a lazy summer night. Bill had been the first to shout out the onset of the eclipse. From that point neither had said anything. Slack-jawed and eyes as big as saucers, they watched intently. Had it been a buggy night, many a bug would have found an open mouth to fly into. And when it was over neither said anything because they did not have to. They knew what each other thought.
The ocean is a harsh master. Few dare to defy and fewer still manage to survive. An unspeakable mass of water moved effortlessly through the night, undetected and unsuspected. Initiated without overt purpose, its direction of movement promised to change more than the ebb and flow of the tide. There was a sense of destiny for each mile it traveled.
All that remained was a thin sliver of light. The moon waned in a matter of minutes. A pseudo-new moon was at hand. It was like the mere blink of an eye that Luna disappeared and the stars triumphantly emerged in dazzling clarity. The Milky Way painted an unmistakable swath across the heavens.
He inhaled deeply, held it momentarily, and exhaled noiselessly. He was for a few seconds at peace, only because of the tremendous awe he felt of what he saw. He let his ever active intellect speculate on how the ancients must have viewed the same phenomenon. It was easy to imagine fear. He laughed at the absurdity of the emotion. Natural events have natural causes. The concept of predetermined fate was clearly outside the rational mind. Yet there was a part of him that did believe there were some things meant to be, that is, they are predetermined.
The old family feeling crashed upon his soul. Tonight would determine everything. All his problems would be automatically solved. He would suffer no more, the agony of loss. There would be far better days to come. And yet, as much as he hoped, he dreaded the exact opposite was about to happen. There was a nagging suspicion tonight was the end of everything. The eclipse of the moon was a sign of the total eclipse of his life. There was little time left. All that was to be done in life had been done, nothing else remained.
Morbid thoughts were usual these days. He pulled himself together. Nothing was going to happen unless he willed it to happen. Unfortunately, that attitude did not always bear fruit. In reality, there was a balance between what was possible and what was not. Bringing back the past was impossible, living in the present was reality, living for the future was lunacy.
The totality of the eclipse seemed a possible forever. He wished it would last forever. Soon enough, a ray of light returned from the sky. Total occultation was over. Luna was emerging from her short exile in Mother Earth’s shadow. He smiled, reminding himself at the great joy the ancients must have felt at this moment. It is too bad we moderns have lost the childish simplicity of the ancient mind to feel the ecstatic joy of seeing the moon return from oblivion, he thought.
The return of light changed everything. The shadows all around resumed their previous shapes. The breeze picked up off the ocean. Even
the cry of a bird intermittently pierced the night air. Life awed to a standstill by the spectacle of the heavens awoke to resume life again. Most, if not all, quickly forgot what had just happened.
To forget is bliss, he mused. There were many things in life too painful to remember. The older he got, the harder it was to forget the past. The only hope was it would not last forever. At some unannounced time in the future he would find rest in the oblivion called death. He wondered what Bill had thought in those last few seconds when he knew it was happening to him. He was absolutely certain he was included in Bill’s final thoughts. The absurdity of his musing overwhelmed his senses and he began to cry.
“Why is this happening to me?” He yelled out into the darkness. “Why me?”
The void yawned back in silence. There were no more answers tonight than any other night. Life was a perpetual search for answers. Perhaps life was in actuality one colossal calculating machine searching for ultimate truths. And maybe it was forever impossible for an individual part of that machine to ever know the collective answers wherever they were found.
The moon’s light returned faster than it had disappeared. He continued watching through teary eyes fighting back sobs. Nothing could be changed and it depressed him deeply. There was medication to help get over the depression, and it did override some of the feelings of hopelessness. But the thoughts remained, forever burning their influence on daily decisions. The side effects, although laughable, were real and potentially depressing in themselves. Drugs were a crutch that he had no use and had abandoned a long time ago. Life is not a drug deficient disease, he echoed in his mind multiple times. It was a credo by which he guided his life. The drug culture of the current generation did not appeal to him nor did he ever become a part.
“Who am I really?” He whispered.
Again, there was no answer forthcoming from the darkness. There was more ambient light which lifted the gloominess of the scene and in another way eased the heaviness on his heart. He always felt better after a good cry. As the moon returned to its full glory a smile returned to his face. He had finally seen what he had planned for several years. There was a certain satisfaction of a mission accomplished. The only problem was being alone in his victory.
He stared at the resurrected moon for an indeterminate time, forcing out all thoughts and feelings from his existence. For a time, he became a fixture of the landscape. Time was suspended in a paradox of logic. The ocean, however, remained vibrantly alive. The earth had shook and the ocean had obeyed.
Sleep was something he had not considered. When he returned from his catatonic state rather than feeling tired, he felt refreshed. Suddenly, he had answers to questions he thought were unanswerable. For a brief moment, he had let go of reality and was rewarded in that surrender with an epiphany. He knew exactly what he had to do. The past would forge a new future. There were real reasons to continue. The past continued to live only as long as the present remembered. He would live as a memorial to his brother; Bill would never die as long as he lived.
Hunger returned. He found a banana and a peach by touch. He ate the peach with gusto, juices dripping from his lips. He wiped his mouth on his forearm. He peeled the banana and closed his eyes while he savored the taste and texture. The fruit sugar invigorated him further. His heart raced and his vision became sharper. This experience was one to remember, he concluded. At last, he could see reasons for continuing. He attempted to banish the morbid thoughts of the night without being totally successful. A feeling of shame swept over him. He never thought of himself as a weak man. And yet, everything he had considered was in actuality spineless musings. The ball had bounced and he was falling back on his previous thoughts. He tried resisting the wave of sorrow crashing over him again. He violently shook his head.
“Not again!” He shouted. “I can’t stand it!”
Was he falling into insanity? Was the isolation of the time and place playing tricks with his perceptions? Would he wake up in the morning and find this was all just a bad dream? Questions followed questions in rapid succession without noble answers. It was too much to bear. The nonsense must stop sometime.
He took a deep breath and exhaled loudly. He knew what he must do to protect himself. He had to go home. He gathered all his equipment in one heap and went to the water’s edge to check the inflated boat that brought him ashore. He found it exactly where he had left it. The boat was reloaded with all his possessions after several trips back and forth. This was not exactly what his original plans were, but he had to get away. A feeling of dread suddenly washed across him.
A voice in his head shouted something was dangerously wrong. He froze where he was and surveyed the surroundings. Nothing appeared unusual or out of place. The ocean for the moment was no different than when he had arrived. There should be no difficulty getting out to the boat anchored in deeper water offshore. He shook his head again and again trying to clear his thoughts of foreboding doom but the thought remained.
He asserting his will over his feelings and pushed the boat into the water. The waves lapped lazily to and fro across the sand. He pushed the length of the boat toward the water and found he was no closer to the water’s edge than when he started. This is strange, he thought, I must be losing it. He pushed again expecting to float in the water, but the water had again receded. Totally confused, he stopped pushing and walked to the water’s edge. As he approached the water moved away from him. Nothing in his experience had prepared him for what he was seeing. The water was receding out as if afraid of his approach. He laughed at the absurdity of the thought. The night was filled with ghosts and demons and this was just another one. However, he knew there was an explanation for everything.
The edge of the ocean moved faster than he could keep up. When he heard the roar, he stopped dead in his tracks. He looked back from where he had started and could not believe how far he had come. The sound of the roar became louder, demanding his undivided attention. In the light of the moon, he saw the giant wave charging toward him.
“Oh my God!” He screamed. “Tsunami!“
The adrenaline surged through his body; he turned and ran back toward the boat. He knew instinctively running was futile. All the signs of disaster were as plain as day and he had ignored them. He never managed to reach the boat. The giant thirty foot wave caught up and crashed over him mercilessly. There was no chance for escape; there was no chance for survival. In those last few moments of consciousness, John finally knew what Bill must have felt and in that he could die peacefully. When the tsunami was over, every trace of him had been erased from the face of the earth. Life would go on without him. The past was now gone and forgotten; nature had performed her wipe out.
Pirates for a Night
The summer season ended abruptly with Labor Day but the good weather was guaranteed to last a lot longer. All summer Dad, John and Bill worked hard to keep the boat running as many fishing trips as was humanly possible. This year John had finally come of age to take the test for his own captain’s license. Dad stood by day after day, night after night allowing John to get the experience needed before soloing. However, once John had the coveted license in his hands, nothing really changed. Dad was not ready to let him loose. There were no hard feelings, but it bruised the ego a little.
“Where’s Bill?” John said.
Mom was washing dishes at the sink in the kitchen. “I think he’s with Ray Suchy,” she said. “They said they would get back from the boat about now. In fact, I think I hear them in the driveway.”
“I’ll go see.” John moved out of the kitchen into the dining room where the view out the front window was easier. “Yes, they’re here.”
The front door opened quickly and Bill led Ray. They both were laughing and grinning. John laughed reflexly and joined in.
“What are you guys up to?” John moved back into the kitchen.
“Nothing,” Bill said. John thought nothing of it. “We just dropped Homo off home.”
“You mean David
,” John said flatly.
“No, Homo!” Ray laughed. “Like jerk or dummy. That guy is really stupid. Oh, hello, Mrs. Christ.”
“Hello, Ray.” Mom smiled. “Let me get out of here and you boys can have the kitchen to yourselves.”
“We were just down at the beach,” Ray said. “Tonight would be a great night to go fishing.”
“Even I wouldn’t get sick,” Bill said.
“I didn’t think you got sick anymore,” John said slowly. “You haven’t complained all summer.”
“Yeah, but I have taken my share of seasick pills.” Bill smiled wanly. “I live to work on nights like tonight.”
“Why don’t we go fishing tonight?” Ray raised his hand. “Johnny, you have your license. You can take us out.”
“Except, I don’t think Dad will let me go alone. I know I can do it. I have my license and experience.”
“Don’t worry about that,” Bill said quickly. “We’ll go out and come back without him knowing anything.”
“I’m not sure I can do that,” John said slowly. “What I mean is, I can do it, but there’s Dad.”
“We all work hard,” Ray said. “We owe ourselves a little free fishing time.”
“I agree,” Bill said. “I really can’t fish the way I want when I work. I have to take care of the customers.”
“What are you going to do with the fish we catch?” John considered the options in his head. “We can’t bring them home to eat.”
“Why not?” Ray laughed. “We catch fish every day. No one is going to suspect we caught them tonight. For all anyone would know, we had them on ice from one of our regular trips.”
“Better yet...” Bill grinned. “We can catch a bunch of fish and sell them. I could sure use the money.”
“Either to eat or sell,” Ray said. “It’s a good idea.”
Against the Sea: Tales On and Under the Sea Page 8