Bon Ton Roulet

"Don't go," she says. "You're getting too much exercise. You're always tired."

The chill dawn sky has segued from purple to magenta to orange to yellow. Sunlight sneaks through grey clouds.

"I become more tired when sedentary," he says.

The pull of the ocean. He sees peaks rise on the surface. They could break. And there's only a single person out. Or is that a seal? A dolphin? Or a swimmer, one of those mermaids or mermen who enter frigid water bare-skinned? They're undaunted. And old. That gal, the one with the hour-glass figure, is in her eighties!

The invitation. The urge. The call goes unattended.

Ralph Anybody on the radio reminds that it's Fat Tuesday. Plays Clifton Chenier, his Zydeco number with accordion, Bon Ton Roluet. Let good times roll.

Party today 'cause Lent starts tomorrow. Splurge before fast.

The call is too great, despite the low-40-degree air temp. He slips into the neoprene suit, zips it tight, slides his 10-ft white, single-finned vessel off the rack. 

She waves from inside the house. He waves back. 

At the shore he walks on sand, still firm from the tidal rise. A young, pale woman in black one-piece suit, stands staring at the watery horizon. He believes she's going in. Will she?

The one from outside is coming in.

"Catch any waves?"

"Not much. Just cold hands."

He recognizes the guy, seen him in the lineup.

The surface of the water begins to texture from the offshore that is blowing cold air through the micro-fibers that cling to his skin. He knows he'll warm up once he starts paddling.

"It's always a blessing," the guy says.

He nods. "For sure." Thinks the guy must be Christian, acknowledging to himself how we interpret words, place labels on others without really knowing them. He's Christian for sure. Knowledge based on experience, like the guy from IBM who would always say, "Have a blessed day." It annoyed him. Like he's selling something. Why was he so prickly? She would say that about him.

Lying on his stomach he paddles into the bumpy bay water, feeling free from the ground, floating, thrust  by his arms and shoulders rather than his legs. A release from gravity. Part of the sea.

He believes man comes from water. Amniotic fluid. Considers all the sea-farers who discovered new worlds -- the Polynesians, Europeans, Sumerians.

His body warms with motion, riding up and over small swells. Loose relaxation. He is surprised by how quickly he distances from the beach.

Breeze is colder than water. Sun rising, peeking behind clouds. A large harbor seal fans out of water, their home. Those guys have fun, the wilder the conditions the happier they seem.

He paddles, his shoulders and back stretching releasing stiffness. Tide has filled in. He pauses to observe the scene he’s seen a million times yet never appears exactly the same, the phenomenon of nature, our ever jostling environment of waves and wiggles, net of jewels.

Lineup markers of cypress and palms, cliff caves and rooftops, how different their relationship to waves becomes with the shifting sands on the bottom that determine where the waves break. Kelly Slater says he carefully studies each surf break before every contest. Knowledge is key.

Sitting upright he becomes colder. Lying prone he avoids wind. He remembers wind surfing here 40 years ago, being blown like a leaf out to sea.

No waves today. Too cold to bob like buoy.

Catching the barest of surface currents when the swells roll through, he paddles toward the beach, into the biting breeze, stopping occasionally to observe coordinates, arriving at the shore with a rush of white water.

He steps quickly across the firm sand, empty, save for the guy who is scratching a birthday message into the sand with a rake. His business comes from hotel guests who observe the beach from above:

Happy Birthday

Ter...

His body shivers as he completes the name in his mind, Terry, or is it Teri? Male or female? A Mardi Gras birthday!

Lent begins tomorrow. He wonders if the blessing guy will be making a sacrifice, a fast of some kind? Giving up an earthly pleasure to connect with something transcendent? 

Will he, himself? 

His hands hurt from the harsh air as he peels the skin-tight rubber off, anticipating the comfort of a hot shower.

She welcomes him home.

"How was it? she asks.

"Cold. Very cold. It feels good.”

He feels so good that he reconsiders his judgment about the blessing guy. Maybe he had a difficult situation, the loss of a loved one, even a child, and he called upon his faith, a higher power, to help him cope. It worked as a gift to him, a blessing. The guy found strength, a transcendence.

He vows that he will try to see the good in everyone he meets, no matter what they say, at least until Easter.