I’m getting up in the dark to pee and there is a very brief, faint swelling of bluish light. And lights dancing on my wall. I investigated.
The lights dancing on the wall are actually on the wall—one of those detectors that detect radon, CO, farts….The gentle, momentary bulge of light is from the lighthouse a quarter mile up the beach. Technically not a lighthouse; a light tower. It has to be an LED light. Incandescent lights with fresnel lenses cast a beam solid enough to walk on; LED lights don’t and yet the light is projected. Sort of. And it is quite bright when you look right at it, as an approaching mariner would. The light rotates three times a minute.
Should you read a chart, you would see that the red and green beacons marking the reef would be labeled 4FR, 2FR, and 5FG. This tells you that the northmost flashes red every four seconds, the one beside it every two seconds and the green one every five seconds. Seeing these, a mariner would know exactly where he or she is, because the pattern is unique to that area. To sound like an old salt, call these navigational aids navaids. And not to put too fine a point on it, these are beacons. Beacons are navaids firmly attached to the substrate, and buoys are navaids that float, anchored to the bottom by a chain.
You don’t need a stopwatch. Count one thousand two thousand three thousand etc and you’ll come close enough.
Yesterday I got into a conversation with my limo driver, a gregarious, animated young man named Jose. I practiced my horrible Spanish on him and (without laughing, bless him!) he extolled the beauty of the language—that unlike English, when you see a letter, pronounce it. I should have mentioned Irish, a language that attaches symbolic meaning to the lexicography itself. I can’t even spell Erse. Muirgheal, for example.
I have been accused of people-watching for the purpose of building characters. Guilty. Here in the dining area of the Marriott are two servers, both extremely helpful and attentive. The gentleman is OCD, and everything has to line up perfectly. The lady is like Lauraine, outgoing, cheerful, and obviously liking people. Across the room, the receptionist seated a couple with a baby. The lady went off and fetched a high chair. The gentleman started to take it out of her hands to place at the table. She swatted at his hands and placed the chair herself. I mentioned it to her afterward. She grinned. Apparently she had called to him three times and he didn’t respond so she got the chair herself.
Here is a lady that don’t take no nonsense. I like her.