CHRISTMAS has long since come and past. New Years, too.
Valentine’s day and the temperature in Naples, Florida, hovers in the low-eighties. The sky is clear, a shade of blue seen only in travel magazines. The water too, though a stiff morning breeze off the Gulf from the southwest has kicked up the surf and the silt. Along the beach the palm trees bend to the will of the wind. I’m feeling lyrical. Even the dolphins cooperate, rising from the water as if jumping through hoops for my benefit. A trio of pelicans does a fly-by, rising on an updraft before crashing back down to the surface of the water at a high rate of speed, diving deep to fetch their dinner.
In years to come, the pressure of the water against their eyeballs will leave them blind. They will no longer be able to see; they will no longer be able to fish. Unable to feed themselves, they will go hungry and die.
Feeling lyrical is not necessarily the same as feeling optimistic.
Along the pier, the tourists and Snowbirds are out in force. Old couples, young couples, and families. This time of year, locals too, though I know from having been here over two months the best time of day to walk the beach or the pier is before ten in the morning and after eight o’clock in the evening.
Leaning at the rail of the pier watching the dive-bombing pelicans, my mobile phone chimes. Unwilling to be disturbed, I don’t answer. Thirty seconds later it rings again. Still, I don’t answer. When it chatters a third time, I pick up, hopeful.
“Gabby?”
No.
“Miss me?” the all-too-familiar voice says.
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