Polaroid: Dead Sailor's Soul's in The eye of every storm

I remember waiting for this photograph to develop. It seems out of place in these adult hands, smaller than the memory of the event, somehow, trapped in a moment of eternal youth. It’s a little out of focus, a little lost around the edges, worn, and tired looking, much like I am now. Beneath the yellowing, the amber hues and the orange time-worn sepia-tone, I can still make out the smile. I had dimples and blue eyes, and I still do, and at least that much hasn’t changed.

We were at the beach. It was Jacksonville, Florida, one summer. My parent’s friend owned an apartment or a condo off of the beach, and, for the moment, my mother and I had the run of the place. My step-father was a homicide investigator. He was supposed to be with us, but humanity reared its ugly head, and while he was in a different world of severed heads and bathtubs, Mom and I were basking in the glory days. I remember the condo being nice, and there was a television, and the first night it was raining. My mother put on The Shining, rented from the combination pizza-video store. I was excited I was staying up late, excited I was watching my first Scary Movie with my mom, safe and secure in her motherly protection from the blood from the elevators, from the blood in the bathtub in which my Step-Father found himself mired.

I’m not sure if I was scared or not. I probably was. I know I loved it, and still love fictitious bloodshed, cheap-pop-scares, and suspenseful music. There’s an element to the anticipation, and yet, still a surprise in the delivery. Sometimes I still close my eyes. Sometimes I hold my hands to my face, and spread my fingers wide enough for one solitary eye to view what the mind so desperately shields itself from with fear.

The next day it wasn’t raining. My grandmother told me the first time I saw the ocean, I ran to the hotel window and placed my hands and face against it, brimming with excitement. “Oh boy, they didn’t turn it off!” I exclaimed, looking at the waves below. I was unaware of science, that life kept churning despite our input. I didn’t want to eat breakfast. I wanted to go down there, to be in the water, to run from the waves snaking their way to the tidal pools. I knew nothing of sharks or jellyfish or Cthulu Mythos. Just the water was there, and they didn’t turn it off.

That day in the ocean, I found a cold spot. I’m not sure if it was the horror movie, or just us (now) sharing the same twisted humor, but my mom’s answer as to why the water was cold in certain area’s chilled me, and still does to this day. “It’s a dead-sailor’s soul,” she said, and I imagined corpse-white hands, encrusted with barnacles reaching up from the depths, yearning for human contact, to consume, much like we do now. She saw the abject terror wash across my face. She made a song out of it, and, in the deep water, arms holding her tight, we floated up and down and sang tales of dead-sailors and shipwrecks and treasure long lost but not forgotten.

Still tied up, my Step-Father wasn’t going to arrive until late the next night. It was a five hour drive south from Golf City. I suppose he had paperwork to fill out. Maybe he had warrants to get. Maybe he kicked open someone’s door and threw their friends head at their feet and dramatically put them under arrest like in the movies. He quit his job and became a teacher later. Finishing that case, now I realize he was just tired. He just wanted to drive south and be with his family, away from mutilation and depravity and the thousand holy horrors land creatures inflicted upon one another.

We went to the zoo. I’d been to a zoo before, the Riverbanks, in Columbia, South Carolina, on a field trip when I was five. After seeing the animals, we piled into the school bus and went to a pizza arcade with animals singing songs on the stage. That trip to the zoo taught me animals didn’t sing, and the one’s on stage were impostors, people desperately attempting to fling their personalities into a world they did not understand. I ate the pizza and exasperated myself with ski-ball. My little arms had yet to develop the strength to fling them up the incline and into the little holes. I received no tickets and did not get the monster rubber finger puppet I so desperately yearned for beneath the plexiglass.

This trip to the zoo, where this picture was taken, was different. It was with my mother. She knew my love and fascination of serpents and explained their slithering ways while I stared in fascination and wonder into their deadly, unfeeling eyes. She spent the extra two dollars and let me feed a giraffe, its tongue catching my hair and pulling it wildly up where it stayed as only the hair of seven year old boys is prone to do. I marveled at their strength, at their eyes, and how long their necks were, unaware they use them in battle against one another, trying to break them in hopes of finding a mate, much like what my Step-Father was dealing with before he drove south.

This picture was taken in front of the elephant. It was a small Asian elephant, and now it looks so sad, confined and decorated. Contrasting the picture, we were together, our arms around each other, smiling and unaware at the psychological turmoil the behemoth endured behind us for our amusement. As a species we relish in another’s pain. We decorate it and celebrate it in elaborate costumes, take pictures with it, and ride it with the hope that we’ll never be there, at least not yet, at least not in that moment.

I wanted to see the picture. Polaroids didn’t care about instant gratification and my mom flung it into her purse as we climbed the stairs. Another three dollars later, and we were atop the elephant, riding it around a confined circular track. Three dollars and I was on an adventure. Three dollars, and the elephant didn’t even get paid. It did its duty, and walked us around the small circle while I smiled and laughed, holding onto the handle in the large saddle and rubbing its skin with my other hand. I remember it had small little hairs, just like I did, and I never saw them from far away. It was only up close did I notice the small delicacies that made this creature alive.

I wonder if that elephant is still alive. Elephants never forget. Would this old man, holding a Polaroid, carrying an elder amount of compassion and wisdom, be recognized by the giant mammal? I’d flash my empathy smile. I’d show him the picture and pet his face and tell him Thank You. I’d tell him I’m so sorry. I’d fold my three dollars and lay it at his feet.

Afterwards, this picture was pulled out of mom’s purse. I stared at it with youthful eyes, beaming at what we had just done, how we rode this titan of the jungle. I thought dead sailors souls were real. I thought my Step-Father had a normal job. I knew my mother loved me. I knew the ocean would never turn off. The color came through, and there were my blue eyes and my sandy blond hair. My mothers blond hair. The elephants tiny brown hairs, quite the paradox for such a large beast of no nation, barely visible. The world was pure, despite how fucked it all was. There was a certain blissful ignorance, just a child with his mother, learning the ways of the world, unaware of the trials of the future, trapped in his current ideal, looking forward with great eagerness to tell his father about that day’s triumph over nature.