Swimming today, I thought to myself: “If a shark gonna get Old Bald Tom, Old Bald Tom gonna be the fastest fast-food that shark ever gonna grab and gobble.”
Ain't a shark made fast enough to catch me. Unless there is a bull, white, tiger, or hammerhead out there (a world record of which was caught not far from here—all one thousand pounds of him, I believe . . . “caught” may not be accurate—harpooned, machine-gunned and depth-charged might be more accurate) with my name on his fin, I’m good to go. I generally enjoy my swims, but I do so close to the beach, with both eyes wide open, so to speak. No way will a shark get the drop on Old Bald Tom. To my knowledge, no one ever has been eaten here on Manasota Key and that’s the way Old Bald Tom wanna keep it, at least until he vamooses the ranch.
Sometimes I see people just puttering leisurely along a hundred yards from shore, seemingly without a care in the world, as if they had died and gone to heaven. Sometimes I almost envy them. But not for long. How anyone can be oblivious to the peril under the surface, especially after the horrific movie, Jaws, is beyond me. And yes, anticipating those mean-well do-gooder dim-wit would-be philosopher types out there who insist, “Well, we all have to die someday and the odds of being eaten by a shark are about the same as going down in a plane crash, about a zillion to one,” I reply, “Well, Socrates, as with both shark attacks and airline disasters, It’s not the death part that worries me so much as the dying part, rather the 'quality of dying.' Swimming is nifty but the thought of being torn to shreds in an expanding circle of my own blood is more than enough for me to swim with all systems on high alert. Thanks for the pep talk, Sock, but you do your thing and I’ll do mine.”
Other mean-wellers laugh and say, “Relax, if God wants you there’s nothing you can do about it.” I agree. But again, if God wants Old Bald Tom he’ll have to get him from some place other than the beach ‘cause Old Bald Tom ain’t a gonna ‘low no shark to rocket his soul into eternity from any seaside launch pad.
When we die, most of us would like to be remembered, if
not for something significant, then at least NOT for something ironic, weird or
ridiculous. My goal today and every day I take the salt is
to 1) enjoy my swim, but 2) NOT be remembered as the first person eaten by a
shark in Manasota Key history!
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Bumper Snickers
Very funny, Scotty. Now beam down my clothes.
Friends help you move. Real friends help you move bodies.
Make it idiot proof and someone will invent a better idiot.
Lottery: A tax on people who are bad at math.
We have enough youth, how about a fountain of SMART?
I've read about the evils of drinking, so I gave up reading.
Dyslexics Untie!
So many stupid people, so few asteroids.
Follow that car, Godzilla--and step on it!
"Criminal Lawyer" is a redundancy.
Forget world peace. Visualize using your turn signal.
WANTED: Meaningful overnight relationship.
I majored in liberal arts. Would you like fries with that?
She's always late. Her ancestors arrived on the Juneflower
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Faces of Meth
