Gulf Sweetness

     Early one morning on a recent trip to Point Clear, very early thanks to my dear girl, I ran across an old Garden and Gun from September 2010. Rick Bragg, the quintessential Southern story teller, wrote an article on the Gulf and the oil spill. And that got me thinking about my Gulf and the horrible spill. Do me a favor and don't compare this post to Mr. Bragg's article!
     I remember watching the fireball that engulfed the Deepwater Horizon and thinking, what does this mean? I never dreamed that a couple of days later I would be watching oil, spewing dark and thick like some demonic fountain, come up through the sweet, Gulf waters.  I felt sick. This could not be good, for anybody. Mr. and I took the kids down to Miss Lee's in Perdido Key later that summer of the spill to prove a point. I grew up with my feet in the Gulf and no British company was going to spoil our summer(s). Then, Son came in from wave chasin' with a drop of oil on his back.
     I grew up wiping tar off my feet, every now and then from a walk on the sugar sand; but this was different. Planes always flew overhead, ABC planes offering putt-putt, the Blue Angels; but this was different. We'd always watch the boats go by on the other side of the sandbar; but this was different. Too many tar balls, too many planes, too many boats. My heart began to sink.
     My parents would take me down to Perdido Key, Perdido Bay, Wolfe Bay, Orange Beach, the blue Gulf when I was little. I'd swim out in the Gulf with them and hop with each passing wave while they floated, holding their outstretched arm high above the water to keep the sweet salty Gulf out of their Budweiser. My Dad and I would dig for sand dollars, with our toes, standing shoulder deep in the warm water pulling up those brown treasures one after another. Mama would soak them in bleach overnight and say they will make nice Christmas gifts. I don't remember those sand dollars ever getting home with us.
     Since the 70's the Gulf coast has grown like weeds. Cut down every so often by a hurricane only to come back thicker and more prolific than before. And that summer of the spill we all wondered if this was the Round-up that would take out our beloved Gulf Coast. I sure did. I wondered if my children would have any memories of the white sand and blue-green water - without the worry of oil. I live around 3 hours, give or take, from the Gulf and take for granted the access to fresh seafood, Alabama shrimp. I worried, would I be relegated to eating frozen shrimp farmed in Thailand? The horror. That summer we waited, too long, to see if the oil could be stopped. Finally, it was. Now what? The scientists say it may be years before they know the true devastation to the Gulf and surrounding ecosystems. I think they are right. But this is my Gulf and I am going to operate business as usual.
      I bought some shrimp a few weeks ago from Destin Connection, a local seafood shop here in town, and as I peeled it, I smelled it. I was hoping that I would not smell the petroleum-smell that we have been warned about. I didn't. It was sweet and slightly salty, and tasted just as good as it smelled. Traffic to the coast has not slacked up, as the 45 minute 5 MPH crawl we were in on the way down last week proved. As my facebook friends declare, "my happy place" is all along the Gulf of Mexico; pictures are posted every weekend of little ones rolling in the waves, or of freshly pedi-cured toes on a backdrop of that white sand and blue-green water. The Hangout Music Fest is a huge success, thanks to my friends at Hummingbird Ideas, and one year Bob and I plan to go for a date-weekend. This past weekend I secretly hoped to see Dave Mathews hanging out, maybe at the battleship, before he performed at Hangout Fest, but to no avail.

On board the USS Alabama. An elderly gentleman offered to take our picture, using Mr.'s phone. The kids are in the lower center.

Super Son.

The summer we proved a point. June 2010

Almost ready to get to the sand, almost. June 2010