A bright spot in a Gray Day

Today is dreary. We've had lots of rain so everything is soggy. We were going to ride bikes to the beach but I heard thunder and so I decided to just have a look at the beach on my way to visit my mum. The waves were kicked up. There were a few folks out there at the edge of the water, their bright swim suits were like drops of water color from a painters brush. The lifeguards looked annoyed, their faces showing that they would probably soon be packing in all the gear they just set up. I liked how it looked but I always do. The beach always looks amazing to me. Okay when we were all anticipating thick waves of oil coming on shore I was more frightened than amazed but since that hasn't happened I can go back to the shear wonder of it. Anyhow, the lack of color inspired me.

The bright spot in the day was having lunch with my mum and her "boyfriend" where she lives at the Stanley House. The Stanley House is an assisted living facility in DeFuniak Springs, FL. It is cozy and warm and filled with caretakers who seem to really care about the folks they look after and cheerfully attend to. Most of the folks who live there are pretty sweet but I can say that on occasion I have witnessed some exceptions to the "sweet" description so that cheerful attendance, I am sure, isn't always easy. But today I think I got a taste of why the caretakers are so patient and tolerant. Everyone in the lunch room seemed happy and pretty care free; the food is good there and it's served hot and on time so what's not to like at lunch time. Sitting with us at the table was another of my mums lunch table mates along with his son. Off and on we shared weather stories. Some small random slices of WWII stories splashed into the conversation here and there. At one point, my mum's boyfriend, relating to how people can get through difficult times, told of an experience he had in the Navy on a destroyer. He talked about being in heavy seas during a bad storm and how as the ship plowed up over the huge waves and crashed down the other side, bolts of the ship would rip and fly off in the strain. He related how the damage from one storm being much worse than anything they encountered in battle and how helpless they felt as they were assaulted by Mother Nature's fury. During the quiet points of his story I could see that he was as good as on that ship reliving moments of the extraordinary hours he spent enduring the storm. His poignant story easily trumped any of the stories the rest of us landlubbers told yet it was offered matter of factly to our group with an ironic humility. His description of the fear they all felt was palpable and he delivered the story with some physical difficulty. Having a father who was a WWII army war veteran who saw hard combat and let loose a scary story now and then himself, I have always had the greatest respect for our nation's brave warriors and aware of the heavy toll of their service. Today I was struck again and deeply by this encounter with an American treasure.

"Hello in there, hello." (John Prine)