Lost At Sea
The weekend of my cousins wedding – we were all on the
beach, all of my family members, except for the one getting married, of course.
She was too busy getting ready for the wedding, but the rest of us were having
a good time. Several of us had just finished playing catch with the football
and decided to go into the water when one of the cousins pulled out a raft. Not
a big raft, but rather one of the flimsy rafts you blow up and relax in the
middle of a pool drinking a pina colada. Not that I drink pina coladas or
anything, because I’m not 21 – that’s just how these rafts are generally used.
This was also a very big raft – big enough for at least two people. And so my
cousins thought it would be fun to take that out into the ocean as they paddled
myself and my other cousin around. Oh yeah, it’s important to know that this
wedding was in Puerto Rico and generally resorts on these tropical islands
don’t have lifeguards to protect their customers. They swim at their own risk;
however, we were not entirely on our own. There was a row of rocks conveniently
placed about 50 yards out so we don’t merely just drift out to sea. Another
thing about Puerto Rico you should know is that their beaches are notorious for
their powerful undercurrent – a feat most fifth graders know little about. I
sure didn’t and apparently neither did my cousins, who were much older, because
after getting about half way out, we tried to turn around and despite our best
efforts the raft just stayed in it’s place. Actually, It probably drifted even
further out. After several minutes of attempting to get our families’ attention
back on shore, and then several more minutes to get them to realize we were
actually in trouble and not just waving to them. By this time, we had drifted
out to those rocks I had mentioned earlier. It was nice to be able to rest,
because all of the paddling was extremely strenuous, however, shortly after
being perched on the rock, we start to feel a slight discomfort in our feet.
After the pain intensified we realized that these weren’t merely just rugged
rocks, but rather, each of us had several sea urchins lodged into the soles of
our feet. But when you put it in perspective, these rocks were the only things
keeping us from roaming out to sea, so that slight discomfort was extremely
trivial in the scheme of things. Amid the panic between the four of us and our
family members searching for a way to help us get back to shore, I look up to
see my mom video taping the entire thing. That’s my mom for you. It’s actually
kind of funny now that I think about it, but it wasn’t in the moment. Anyways,
while my mom was video taping, my uncle found a wire that I guess was connected
to one of the rocks and he was able to maneuver his way out to us and help us
get back to shore by holding on to the wire. The next day, my cousin had her
beautiful wedding on the beach, with the romantic Puerto Rican sun as her
backdrop, and although those pesky urchins were still stuck in our feet,
everything just seemed OK.
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