Pilgrim in the Trailer Park

 We went for a walk in Spruce Creek Park. It’s down the road from our house, heading south towards New Smyrna Beach. We walked through the woods, over several wooden planks, to the treehouse. I prayed we didn’t see a snake! We didn’t (why do I go on these adventures?). Just the small holes of fiddler crabs. We walked up the two levels of stairs to the top (I need to stop smoking (I did not bring cigarettes with me)).  What a view (and I’m not talking about the various graffiti inscribed on the wood). Then we walked past the treehouse, down a dirt road to a worn grassy trail that leads to a picnic shelter (tightly packed with picnic tables), and farther yet, past the “END OF TRAIL” sign (says who?), where there must have been water once, according a myriad of mangrove sprouts. “Is that poop?” No, it’s just small balls of dirt that small creatures move to dig holes. We could walk no further: the non-trail ended. My back was sweaty and I yearned for a cold water. The flies were c...

 Today we walked in Ponce Inlet; on the beach, on a wooden trail, and through the woods. A lot of people had dogs with them. We sat on the large rocks by the water, as it lapped on shore: glue-a-glug-a-glug. “I like that sound,” I said to John. We scooped wet sand into our hands and let the water dissolve it. We walked barefoot and carried our shoes. The wet sand is easy to walk on. The sand is speckled with broken shells and rocks. We trudged to the actual beach to find that the jetty is closed. There was a long black pipe stretched along the beach, perhaps connected to the barge in the water. “Do you see those poles on each side?” John said, “They’re called spuds.” Hmm. Like a potato, I thought. Everything is named for a reason; there is a history behind words (Ponce Inlet is surely named for Ponce de Leon). We saw a man surfing with a parachute in the ocean; it looked fun; he did some high jumps over the waves. “How far do you wanna go?” John asked after we had walked the beach ...

 A momma and her ten ducks waddled into the porch. I was reading a book when I saw them and I screamed; they scattered. They coalesced like a swarm, going out and coming back in. Then I lost track of them. But I looked. And there was one duckling in the field, meeping. He got separated. I tried to catch him (John said “What are you going to do with a baby duck?”) but he ran into the woods. Then Kenny got involved (“what’s going on?”) and we discovered him in a neighbor’s fenced back yard where they have dogs. He kept meeping. “He’s going to get picked up by a bird” he said. He disappeared but then we tracked him across the street, towards the water, and failing to catch him (he almost grabbed him) he went into the water and floated away. I went inside and looked up on the iPad “Can a baby duck survive without its mother?” It said not likely. I feel bad. Maybe by some miracle he will survive.