|
Copyrights reserved by the author. If you are in doubt, please click on 'Copyrights' and read the details. In an uncertain world, a beach chair as a symbol of permanence by J. G. Fabiano Once again I find myself sitting in my old and dilapidated beach chair reminiscing about the summer that is about to come to an end. Most people I know seem reluctant to let it go - maybe that's because we're all afraid of what might lie ahead. It was a short summer, truncated by rain and haze through June and July and people seemed to have a harder time relaxing this year. The second anniversary of September 11 is just around the corner, its horrific images burned into our memories forever. A few months ago we thought the war in Iraq was over but since then we have lost more of our children than during major combat operations. Many of our politicians say we won the war but we are losing the peace. I, for one, didn't realize that we were there to win anything. I thought we were there to protect the world from weapons of mass destruction. I also thought we were there to protect the Iraqi people, the world, and ourselves. During the past year we were given many reasons for going to war. There were weapons of mass destruction that aimed at us, just like the weapons of mass destruction aimed at us by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Back then we did everything we could not to go to war because we understood that war wasn't the solution to anything but the end of everything. During 2003 it seems we did everything we could do to go to war. Even though we are still looking for the weapons of mass destruction I am thrilled we couldn't find them because if they had been used against us we would have lost many more of our children. I always consider this time my New Year's Eve. Being a school teacher, the end of summer marks the time when I once again become part of the dreams and aspirations of a new class of young students. Every year these young men and women seem to me to become smarter and more motivated. I don't need any state or federal test system, that will take money away from much needed education programs, to prove that our children are working hard so that they can enjoy their futures. News reports that tell us today's children are not as smart as the children of the past simply don't get it. Today's youth have to deal with technologies and matters of society that no child in the past was ever confronted with. Because of this, my last day at the beach is a great time to reflect on what the future has in store for us all. Looking around me, and observing many others staring blankly at the sea as if looking for the answer there, it is clear that I am not alone. Little children still play happily while their parents fret about the future, unworried by the big questions that vex the rest of us. They don't worry because they were promised a wonderful future as long as they worked hard and played hard. They don't realize that every generation that went before them was made the same promise and, in our ever-changing world, it is a promise that does not always become a reality, but, I'm sure as hell not going to tell them. Watching people walk down the beach and stop to look at the horizon I wonder how many are worried about their financial future. It was only a couple of years ago that we enjoyed remarkable economic times. All anyone talked about was how they were going to buy this or that or where they were going on their winter vacations. Many of those vacations involved trips to exotic destinations where the almighty dollar ruled supreme. Today the dollar is in decline, most people are worried about hanging onto what they've got, Americans abroad are targets like they have never been before, and even if they could afford to anywhere this summer it was a few days at York Beach. I see my friends and neighbors at the beach too, wandering along the waterline, talking quietly, almost somberly to each other. These people are not on vacation, they are simply trying to enjoy why they moved here in the first place. They are worried too. I wonder if they are worried about something that has the potential to change all of our lives. I wonder if they are worried about the casino, that has the potential to transform all our lives. I wonder how many of them believe there will be 10,000 new jobs for Mainers and millions of extra tax dollars that will make all our economic woes disappear. I believe I was the only one who bothered to take a chair to the beach last Saturday morning, at the start of the Labor Day weekend, to sit down there by the waterline and watch the waves roll in. Everybody else I saw seemed to be restless, wandering back and forth, or simply standing there and staring out to sea, looking for answers that weren't there. I wasn't sure if it was just me but there was an intensity about people this Labor Day weekend that I haven't seen before. Instead of the relaxed manner of people who have been restored by the summer there was a nervousness and a trepidation in a place that has always been synonymous with peace. As I shifted in my chair, trying to stop the blood pooling in my butt and push it down to my legs to restore some of the circulation, I heard a distinct tearing sound. I froze, wondering if it was yet another part of my aging body giving up on me, but then I realized it was just the seat of my beach chair deciding that it could no longer hold up under my weight. I got up, slowly and with great care, before it gave way altogether and I made yet another public spectacle out of myself. With a twinge of sadness I folded my dilapidated old beach chair and slung it over my shoulder for the walk home, where I would have to face a new dilemma : Should I mend it or throw it out and buy a new one? By the time I had walked up the beach I already knew the answer. I would mend it, even if it meant going to the trouble of putting in a new seat when it would be cheaper and easier to buy a whole new chair. It's what the times seemed to call for. Besides, it was my faithful beach chair, it was part of me. An icon and a symbol of summer days spent with my toes in the sand, listening to the shouts and laughs of children playing, of watching the gulls dive into the waves, of feeling the cool ocean breeze in my face while I observed all those around me pondering the imponderable. Whatever the future may bring, I knew, me and my beach chair would be back next summer. The End
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
