Spaghetti with a side of Freedom
The chap working in the self-checkout at the grocery store tells me that the first microwaves hit the market in ‘73, and the first brand of TV dinners was Banquet. Fascinating! I informed him that Banquet is shit. I’m more of a Marie Calendar Mac ‘n Cheese guy myself and proudly show him the box I got. He agrees with me and says his go-to is the Spaghetti by the same, and he accentuates it with slices of cheddar. I like him.
I’ve often thought of the how impactful that invention has been on my life. It’s life-changing in the way Eli Whitney’s cotton gin or Henry Ford’s production line has been, yet it’s neglected. Like women’s suffrage, it advanced the freedoms and rights of a sect of the population underrepresented and under appreciated - single guys. On that glorious day that Banquet hit market, we were freed from the prison of the kitchen and let out into the world. With Banquet freedom, I put the bike in first gear and promptly realized the throttle is stuck. The humidity seized up the mechanical action of the handle. Couldn't yank it free so I went back upstairs and got the WD-40 again. Sprayed copious amounts around the handle parts and squeezed it and pried it back again and again, and finally got it to work again. Apparently not riding it in almost a week is not a good idea this close to the water. Although I haven't had issues before, and the humidity in Gulf Shores was wild too. Hmmm. Whatever the case, I’m on my way to see what looks like pea soup garnished with dead trees.
Between bouts of field time I’ve been working on my book, and found an interesting mixed crowd at the Panama City Beach Library. Retirees look for books and get schooled on computers while homeless mill about between them. I finish my work and as I leave the library I overhear that one librarian is forty years younger than the other, so they switch up tasks and the younger one does all the help with the computers while the other tends the main desk. I get on the bike and head past the beach to Saint Andrews State Park.
My timing sucked these last few months. All along this fucking coast I've missed the prime-time events, from leaving a few weeks before Dias de los Muertes near the Mexican border, Mardi Gras in Orleans, and now catching the retirement crowd before the lively ones start to come. Now I'm in a retirement city where the useless wear t-shirts that say where they're from as a sort of uniform, a way of sorting themselves out and finding even more commonality in the vast sea of golf carts and fanny packs. I wonder if they accomplished their dreams of youth, or are they anguished by their failure of it, lamenting in their most private moments the one that got away, the chance not taken, the unknown thrills sacrificed for known comfort. That one there - the one sipping their limoncello and relaxing in his Michigan t-shirt - is he in retrospective hell now? Does a retrospective hell over vodka crans await me? Does a similiar fate await you?
One measuring stick I've heard for the human life are Saturn Returns, which occur when the planet Saturn returns to the position in its orbit that it was at the time of one’s birth. Thus, the first return occurs when one is 29 or 30 years old, repeating in even increments afterwards. The first return is often a time of transition when one realizes that youth is not forever and that they must look to the future, while the second return is often a time when one is considered to have arrived at maturity and their stock of achievements can be evaluated.
Saint Andrews, where a windstorm swept through and shaped the beach. On the day prior, the gulf was whipped white by the wind and I hadn’t seen it pushed around so furiously like that before. There's a stellar section of the beach that’s been eroded away into cliff, and layers and layers of accumulated sand and shells that go up over my head are packed into it’s face. I found some really cool shells here, the best I've seen along the gulf so far.
I believe I’ve had the classic Florida nature experience here. I started by snapping off a few shots of some ducks swimming in a swamp and then left the trail behind and found a gorgeous pool with green algae coating the entire surface. I glimpsed a heron trying to snap a twig off a branch and almost fall off when the tension finally gave way until it flapped its wings and stabilized itself. It took off and flew to a nearby tree, and when it flew back to grab another branch I realized it was building a nest. Neat. Just beyond it’s burgeoning nest lay a lake where an an alligator swam lazily in the distance. At sunset I found a stellar display of light reflecting off the water, and I shot it until the dark came out the frogs started to croak in the water. It was sublime at every interval.
Later in the week I returned to Saint Andrews and found crystal clear shallows full of grass that would sway as the water swelled in and out. I was enthralled by it and I must have spent a good half hour in there with my hood on to block the wind. When I looked up there were four people standing atop a nearby dune, all watching me. I sheepishly waved and we all laughed. Hah shit, my hobby is embarrassing at times. But the upside to living like this is that I don’t have to worry about it because I’ll never see them again.
This guy was fluffing his wings and washing himself.
I’m amazed at how alive this place is, especially at a time when entire valleys are still in the dead of winter back home. One of my favorite local resident here are red-winged blackbirds, and their song instantly reminded me of summers in Colorado where their song would roll out over the grassy plains from their shrubby perches. I ended up shooting a ton of birds and ran through the battery a good hour before sunset. Oops. All good though because I left after sunset feeling rejuvenated and disconnected from responsibility. I spent the night going through the 330 pics and getting it down took just a few.
