A Walk to Remember.

Date: Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Location: Douglass Bay beachfront, North of Portsmouth, Dominica

When you don’t have a calendar, the haunts of Halloween don’t necessarily occur on October 31st. They don’t always occur at night. There isn’t always a rickety house with creaky stairs involved. Your skin can still goose bump as the hair on the back of your neck stands up.

He didn’t have a calendar.

Tuesday started out about as normal as any day following a mini exam should. The boys had created a list of things to do with Dad the night before, anxious for time to do what little boys love. We started out by heading up to Douglass Bay. I had assumed that by getting further away from Portsmouth to “shell hunt” the pickings might be better. We parked the car along the side of the road and got out to start putting sunscreen on. We soon were met with some scowls from the white woman that lived across the road. She must not have been enamored by the idea of someone parking between her house and the beach while she was doing her yoga on her porch, but thankfully she refrained from any less than overt gesticulations of her feelings. I finally got the boys directed down the beach heading southwest towards Cabrits. The sea was churning fairly roughly that morning, throwing salty spray up on us as we traversed the beach covered with basketball size rocks. The boys enjoyed a lizard chase that ended with a catch and a present for Dad to carry around on his shoulder until the lizard decided to jump and run. Crab traps made of chicken wire and sticks sitting idly hearkened of other days. We squeezed through a narrow spot where a palm tree had fallen leaving a boy high root ball in the way. We finally reached a spot where a tree was growing out far enough toward the water to prevent us from passing without getting ourselves soaked, so we paused to explore. I had to call Ethan back from heading down a narrow trail toward a rusty junk pile. Logan showed him where to find small black snails attached to the rocks.

I don’t really recall the details of what happened next. He was just. There. Like the clouds that settle in over Morne Diablotin, harbingers of an Atlantic storm. Not a definable moment, not a beginning, not an end. Just. There. Unassuming. Present, but somehow empty at the same time. Just. There. A few brief pleasantries were exchanged and he tried to engage the boys in conversation. They didn’t notice, as if he wasn’t. There. He soon settled on a basket sized stone and gazed into the distant breeze as though substance had no meaning and void was tangible. His kempt graying hair was lightly billowing in the Caribbean morning. I looked around to find another stone to sit on, but it’s as if the beach had been cleared of stones. Except for his. And he was. There. So I stooped nearby and looked intently at him. Who is this man, I wondered, that has emerged from the shadows of the rain forest to settle himself in our tranquil morning? The boys bring a hand full of snails to show me, walking right past. Him. Again, he gently spoke to them. Again, ignored as if the voice wasn’t there. He spoke of a simple life of fishing the sea and catching crabs. Delicious crabs. Very delicious. Very delicious. I turned to look and see what he was looking at across the bay. I don’t know if what he saw was in the mist or through the mountain, but I haven’t been blessed with the ability to see it. I know it was there because I trusted that he saw it. Trusted a simple graying man dressed only in underwear and carrying a tattered pair of shorts. I spoke a few more times then gathered the boys to leave. “Come here” he said, and turned to walk into the damp overgrown trail. Not a demand, nor a command, but more of a shared insight into where we would be standing a few seconds hence. Spoken as if the control of the strings of our life’s puppet had suddenly but gently been wrought from our grasp and were being gently directed by his calloused hands. We pensively followed and he began to explain the various flora and fauna in terms of their food value or healing power. A slow unhurried pace of speech that measured with his step. It wasn’t long that we arrived at his “fishing camp” as I would later describe it to the boys. “This isn’t where I live” he said. Was my demeanor judgmental such that he felt the need to defend this point? We followed him “in” and sat down. We were enveloped in a small hut made of heavy gauge plastic draped over carefully placed sticks and propped in the middle to shed the rain. The floor was similarly constructed with the plastic laying directly on the ground. Small stones were carefully lined up side-by-side along the edges of the plastic to hold it down. A car rim with a grate on top sat on a stump just outside. On the grate was a cooking pot. He offered us a place to sit. A broken seat situated on a coffee can. A stump. A plank bench. I sat on the floor and looked around some more. Several plastic spoons and forks neatly placed on a broken piece of plywood. A machete lying near an old coffee can containing heavy fishing line. “Do you sell the fish you catch?” I ask. “No, I eat them.” He answers. We linger for a few more moments, and then excuse ourselves. “Thank you for showing us around.” I tell him. “God bless.” He says. We return down the short trail to the beach. “Dad, he should totally live there” were the words spoken by my six year old son. Somewhere, Logan had begun to see him. Just before turning the corner, I turn to look again at where we had come from. He wasn’t. There.

To this day, I cannot believe what happened that morning. As quickly as he had appeared in our lives, he had disappeared again. Leaving me with a feeling of debt and a sense of emptiness. Empty for not seeing what he saw as he gazed across the bay. Empty for not understanding the plight of mankind. Empty for feeling that so many things I hold close are really just a mist to be seen through. Empty for seeing that one man’s earthly possessions consisted of a few old coffee cans, a machete and some fishing string. Indebted to those who, while suffering in obscure poverty, cannot be paid with minted coin or pressed bill for their contributions of simplicity that rattle the very foundations of who I am and whom I desire to become.