LOST AND FOUND

Ocean Beach at Christmas.  The tourists stand on the sea wall watching the surf.  Next to them is a drunk homeless man repeatedly throwing his belongings down to the ground with great anger.  A row of surfers stand on the wall also.  They too look out to sea.  In the middle of it all, the tree droops.

This is the longest pier on the west coast.  After work, fishermen line the rails…mom, dad, and kids all with poles and buckets.  There’s a restaurant out toward the end.  Everyone says it serves great food.  They also carry live bait and fishing supplies. 

I wasn’t there when the pier was built, but I was there when the wall was built.  In 1983 the previous wall and boardwalk washed away in the big storm.  I was there when the new lifeguard tower was built.  That 1983 winter, I stood with a lifeguard friend at the top of the new tower and watched the old boardwalk wash away.   

1983

The tower was probably way too small even when it was first constructed.  It certainly is too small now.  Outcroppings of containers and storage units sprout along its sides these days.  Things were a bit hard to find when it was new, probably only a rigid structure makes items findable now.  

The lifeguards offer first aid and caring….a wonderful commodity for the newcomers on the sand.  During the summer, you can see rows of people lined up with their feet in buckets of hot water.  Hot water helps with the sting from sting rays. 

From up in that three story tower, they can also see disasters before they happen.  Down toward the jetty, two school busses pull up to the sand.  Young high school or college kids leap out, run into the sand, set up their towels, and run into the ocean.  They run right into a rip, and the rip pulls the lot of them out to sea.  By the time they run toward the surf, lifeguards in the tower have sounded the alert.  Now there are guards in the water, boats and jet skis further out to sea, and guards running into the water after them.

Some of us don’t see the homeless man pounding his belongings to a pulp.  Today they do see the guards cautioning the young kids heading into the surf. 

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• Himself:  Working hard during the day then it is off to the Makers Place to work on boxes till 8 or 9.
• Myself:  Managed to mislay my hard-won driver’s license.  Found in the laundry.  41F at the pool this morning.  Helping to shelve 4 pallets of books tomorrow morning.
• Reading:  ”Fadeout” a very good mystery.
• Gratitude’s:  For the inner calmness as I hunted for the  DL.