beneath my palm-trees .. sat a weeping – no one to ask me why I wept …
Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side, I sat a weeping: in the whole world wide There was no one to ask me why I wept, And so I kept Brimming the water-lily cups with tears Cold as my fears.
Beneath my palm-trees, by the river side, I sat a weeping: what enamoured bride, Cheated by shadowy wooer from the clouds, But hides and shrouds Beneath dark palm-trees by a river side?
Song of the Indian Maid by John Keats as published in The Oxford Book of English Verse: 1250–1900 (Oxford, 1919).
On Labor Day, my wife and I walked through the Widgeon Point Preserve on Lemon Island in Port Royal Sound in the heart of the South Carolina Low Country.
As it says on the park website, A hiking loop travels the perimeter of the adjacent hummock island. The loop is a wide, flat nature trail that travels through pines, palms, and oak trees. Views of the river can be seen from several different vantage points. The various coastal habitats of Widgeon Point Preserve support a rich diversity of wildlife and plants. Visitors have extraordinary opportunities to observe the natural beauty of the Lowcountry.
It had just rained and the muddy path was filled with little mud marsh crabs that gave you the feeling that the path itself was alive.
It was a extraordinary opportunity to observe.
And also an opportunity to learn.
We knew we lived in the low country of South Carolina.
We knew we lived in Beaufort County, South Carolina.
But we didn’t know that Beaufort County is SO LOW that during high tide, up to 50% of Beaufort County is under water.
sailors expression about weather: the weather is a great bluffer
As long as there is one upright man, as long as there is one compassionate woman, the contagion may spread and the scene is not desolate. Hope is the thing that is left to us, in a bad time. I shall get up Sunday morning and wind the clock, as a contribution to order and steadfastness.
Sailors have an expression about the weather: they say, the weather is a great bluffer. I guess the same is true of our human society—things can look dark, then a break shows in the clouds, and all is changed, sometimes rather suddenly. It is quite obvious that the human race has made a queer mess of life on this planet. But as a people we probably harbor seeds of goodness that have lain for a long time, waiting to sprout when the conditions are right. Man’s curiosity, his relentlessness, his inventiveness, his ingenuity have led him into deep trouble. We can only hope that these same traits will enable him to claw his way out.
Hang on to your hat. Hang on to your hope. And wind the clock, for tomorrow is another day.
Letter to Mr. Nadeau, March 30, 1973. Letters of E. B. White, Revised Edition. Ed. Martha White. New York: HarperCollins, 2006.
For the first time this hurricane season, folks in the low country are been alerted to the possibility of water … lots of it.
We are are just miles from the Atlantic Ocean which is a lot of water to begin with.
We have roads that with signs that say, “Road Ends in Water.”
I puzzled over these signs for a bit, wondering why they didn’t say, “ROAD ENDS – 500 FT” until I figured it out that in an area with an 8 foot vertical tide, just WHERE the road ends is a matter of time and tide, but for sure, the road ends at the water.
Then a storm, though whether or not its a hurricane or a tropical storm, the weather people or the storm itself hasn’t made up its mind, is coming.
Storms bring storm surges or push more of the Atlantic Ocean up into the low country which is low as the name implies.
I do not worry a lot about storm surge, as I live in Bluffton, which as the name implies, is up on a bluff over the Maye River, it would take a storm surge of some 25 feet or more to get to me.
A storm surge of 10 feet on top of a high tide, would surely strand me here on the bluff as most of the local roads would be covered.
Then there is the coming rain.
Lots of it.
Then there is the malicious nature of this coming storm.
Though the folks who know don’t know what kind of storm it will when the storm is coming they do agree on two things.
One is that it is FULL of rain from the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
The other thing is that the storm will get here to the coast between Savannah and Charleston and … stop.
Not that the raining will stop but the storm will stop and for anywhere between the next 10 to 48 hours, rain of Old Testament Bible stories will fall on us from the heavens.
When you drive through the streets of old Charleston, intersections have depth gauges to show how deep the water can get.
Charleston is about 2 feet about sea level.
During high tide, you can hear water roaring through the storm drains just inches below the road beds.
Drop 6 inches of rain at high tide on Charleston and you can figure out why those depth gauges on intersections have a four foot scale.
On its website, the city of Savannah has posted a city map that show which intersections will be flooded.
Savannah is also on a bluff above the Savannah River but it also has a storm water sewage system that is about 100 years old.
Some schools are already closing for the day, Wednesday.
And all of this is speculation.
I have worked with enough weather people to know that nobody knows nothing when it comes to forecasting.
As Mr. White writes, the weather is a great bluffer.
But we all take warning.
And as Mr. White writes, I guess the same is true of our human society—things can look dark, then a break shows in the clouds, and all is changed, sometimes rather suddenly. It is quite obvious that the human race has made a queer mess of life on this planet.
I take heart both for the storm and the mess of life that the human race has made on this planet when I consider:
But as a people we probably harbor seeds of goodness that have lain for a long time, waiting to sprout when the conditions are right. Man’s curiosity, his relentlessness, his inventiveness, his ingenuity have led him into deep trouble. We can only hope that these same traits will enable him to claw his way out.
lights on the water shrimp boats tied up to the dock shrimp, shrimpers on break
Night time at the shrimp docks.
We went hoping to see the northern lights but the lights we saw were on the boats at the Hudson’s Restaurant on the shrimp dock.
The shrimp boat were tied and the shrimpers were inside at the bar.
What do the shrimp do when not being caught?
Do they know they shrimpers are taking a break.
Do they sigh in relief that they made it through another day?
Do they look at each other and say, ‘What a day!’ or ‘That was a close one!’
Do they gather at a bar an exchange stories of close calls with all those things that want to eat them?
Do they live in ignorance that their world is filled with all those things that want to eat them?
Or do they live with the goal that they might someday be a part of some magical dish of shrimp served in a waterside restaurant where they are the end of someone else’s day.
Maybe next time I order a shrimp boil, I will think of this.
S C D O T suggestions for your commute ummmm, avoid rush-hour …
They tell a joke in Michigan that there are two seasons, Winter and Construction.
They tell a joke in Michigan that the State Flower is an orange traffic cone.
At least in Michigan, they tell jokes about the Department of Transportation.
Down here in the Low Country, the South Carolina Department of Transportation is a joke.
Full transparency, the State of South Carolina is as poor as the dirt in the salt marshes (read swamps, alligator infested swamps) that make up up half the State.
Since moving here, the Hilton Head Island Bridge has been a topic of discussion but nothing besides some traffic studies have been done.
This despite the fact that the United States Corps of Engineers will NOT give the current bridge a ‘Safe to Use’ certificate.
When we drive to Savannah we take SC Highway 17.
It has been under construction to change it from 2 to 4 lanes since we moved here almost 4 years ago.
Turns out it has been under construction for 7 years.
One of the steps in building a road down here is pile up enough dirt to get the road bed out of the swamp.
They have to build it twice as high as you might think then wait for a year or more for it to settle into the pluff mud before they can pave it and start using it.
That and a lot of other problems just seem to plague road building down here.
But when you build a road through a swamp you are going to have problems.
Did not anyone in the SCDOT ever watch Monty Python and the Search for the Holy Grail and the saga of Swamp Castle?
The Castle Owner declaims, “I’ve built this kingdom up from nothing. When I started here, all there was was swamp. All the kings said I was daft to build a castle in a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show ’em. It sank into the swamp. So, I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third one. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up.”
Go another couple miles and you get to the State of Georgia.
There is a lot to not like about Georgia if you look for it but I have to say the build roads seemingly overnight.
In my 12 years of commuting in Atlanta, I can’t count how many freeway projects I saw start and complete in an amazingly short amount of time.
Even when a section of freeway bridge burned up, they got it fixed in reopened in a matter of weeks.
They call this part of the United States, the Low Country.
People who live here wink at you and say, “It’s really the SLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLOW country.”
And Boy Howdy! but is it.
There is a significant number of people who live in the Savannah area and use Highway 17 to commute to jobs up here in the Hilton Head area.
One of my coworkers makes the trip once a week.
For those commuters, the SCDOT gave a list of tips for using Highway 17.
The first tip is, Avoid rush-hour if at all possible.
Just makes you feel good knowing these folks are out there.
said his thoughts aloud many times – there was no one that they could annoy
He did not remember when he had first started to talk aloud when he was by himself.
He had sung when he was by himself in the old days and he had sung at night sometimes when he was alone steering on his watch in the smacks or in the turtle boats.
He had probably started to talk aloud, when alone, when the boy had left.
But he did not remember.
When he and the boy fished together they usually spoke only when it was necessary.
They talked at night or when they were storm-bound by bad weather.
It was considered a virtue not to talk unnecessarily at sea and the old man had always considered it so and respected it.
But now he said his thoughts aloud many times since there was no one that they could annoy.
From The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway (Charles Scribner’s Sons. 1952).
When I have to be in the office, I like to go in early.
I get to see the sunrise out of the Atlantic Ocean.
I get to drive through an empty resort town with too many people still asleep from their efforts to enjoy this resort town.
I get to the office early.
The ladies who clean the resort buildings are just finishing up with the offices.
I often catch them vacuuming.
They often catch me with their vacuuming.
So sorry sir, they mummer.
Worried they might annoy me I guess.
Da Nada, I reply.
I learn their names and say buenos dias but they always call me sir.
I work at desk in the quiet and the ladies come in and empty the wastebaskets and clean the desktops … and they see the pictures of me and my grand children.
I also showed the ladies pictures of my new grand daughter and they laugh and smile and congratulate me.
I enjoy the quiet.
And I wonder, what do these ladies think of me and pictures.
