crab

They say watching the ocean for 7 minutes will realign your mind – I’m not sure if that’s true, but my reasons this day for staring at the dark grey deep, was not really about re-aligning my mind. It was an extremely heavy water winter cape storm day – the stretch of coast I had frantically decided upon was wild and very rugged – the kind of remote coast that one could very easily be disappeared.

I was watching a particular area of reef that appeared to be a malevolent cauldron of raw open ocean swell, violently setting upon the shore, as if destroying every molecule of rock was its life’s only mission.

I was watching the ocean surge and gargle deeply as every new swell sucked the reef completely dry and then set upon the exposed rock with such ferocity once again the very ground, I was standing on would shudder.

I suddenly noticed a crab within this cauldron of complete mayhem – it was making its way into the very heart of the oceanic nuclear explosion. The exact point of detonation that would render all living things utterly vaporized. With every swell washing over the bare rock, I would wait until the wild water would pull back and I would frantically search for the brave little creature in the midst of this extreme danger. I almost felt guilty that i was witnessing this don coyote moment, where the windmill was really a force 7 mutant hurricane.

The little crab seemed to survive several phenomenally intense barrages of the open ocean sea. However, the last time I ever saw the little creature alive, was a second of time frozen within my cranium. The creature seemed to stop and through the extreme mayhem happening round it, looked back at me with a conscious moment of complete clarity. I was very much on the safety of dry land; the little crab was frozen in its reality intensity of the extreme moment. For that brief split second, we were both very much alive. A much larger than usual wave surge impacted that exposed reef and I immediately knew the little crab had been completely obliterated.

I imagined tiny pincers, a carapace, stalk eyes, nails and flesh completely eviscerated by an extremely angry grey ocean.

Many years after that exact moment, I was again reminded of that little out of its depth crab – the mind is an interesting maze of accumulated information. We pull from its mystery value only when we really need to rely on and understand its full circle of life meaning.

I had had an incredible meal – the steak I had ordered had come from the exact steak house I used to frequent many years previously. I acutely remember the after taste of the pepper sauce I so loved. If I closed my eyes, I could remember the minute detail of the roaring fireplace, The bar counter, even the route to the toilet through a maze of passages through the door next to the kitchen.

I found myself once again staring into what appeared to be, in this case a calm cruel ocean surface.  As I stared into its mirrored surface, I noticed what can only be described as very angry condemnatory eyes, angrily staring back at me.

The pristine mirror surface showed a metal cranium cap, and I could not move an inch. However, it was the nature of the eyes through the veil that caught my full attention and for a brief second in time, I identified with the little completely vulnerable crab, who found itself in the now fully understood nuclear zone.  As I was looking back at myself, looking at the crab, in that split 7 seconds before the complete mayhem would overtake all my senses.