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Diving in Key Largo An Excerpt from Corporate Polytricks By: Michael D. Kerrigan After multiple tollbooths, they reached the park on Mullet Key, the last of a chain of small islands off the southern tip of the Pinellas peninsula. “Park over there,” she said. “It’s just a short walk.” “Wow,” he said. “This must be what all Florida beaches looked like before they started building hotels and condos.” “Yeah, except for the Australian Pines,” she said. “Those big trees?” “Uh-huh, they imported them to keep the islands from shifting around the way nature intended.” “What’s wrong with that?” “’It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature,’” she said, then added, “Seriously, though, introducing exotic plants and animals to an area can screw things up. The Everglades is a perfect example. They brought in these things and, along with the melaleuca, Brazilian pepper, and the sugar cane, they’re not only choking out the native plants, they’re drying up the Glades.” “It’s just a big swamp,” he said. “What good is it?’ She stopped walking and turned to him, her mouth agape. “Well, aside from supplying South Florida with fresh water, the Everglades is home to millions of birds and animals, including some endangered ones like the Florida Panther. Besides, all our ecosystems work in harmony. If you fuck up one, it has an effect on all the others. Swamps, deserts, old growth forests -- they all make up our environment -- something we can’t live without.” “Whoa, take it easy. I was just putting you on. You’re absolutely right, we have to preserve nature. In fact, I’d really like to see the Everglades.” “Good,” she said, “go to Key Largo with me Memorial Day weekend. We’ll drive right through the middle of it.” “Key Largo?” He set his gear down and began to unpack. “Yeah, I’m going to visit my brother and his wife. They run a dive boat there.” “A dive boat? SCUBA diving?” “Uh-huh. You ever been diving?” “No, but it’s something I’ve always wanted to try.” “Well, come with me then. We can stay on their sailboat with them.” “A sailboat? I’d love to.” He stood, took her by the shoulders, gave her a quick kiss, and said, “Now take off your clothes.” # “They call U.S. 41 the Tamiami Trail,” Jill said, “because it connects Tampa to Miami.” “It also connects Florida to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula,” Alan told her. “Really? I knew it went up north but I didn’t know it went that far. Kinda one extreme to the other, isn’t it?” “Extreme’s a good word for it, but it’s also beautiful. I went there a couple summers when I was a kid with a friend and his family. It’s wild and unspoiled -- pretty country.” She sighed, “Like Florida used to be.” “What do you mean? Florida’s beautiful.” “Oh, Alan, it’s changing so fast. This road reminds me of what Florida was like when I was a kid, and yet, some sections are vivid examples of what it’s becoming. There’s just too many people moving here.” “Should I go back to Minnesota?” She leaned over, kissed his cheek, and said, “No, you stay. But everybody else has to go back where they came from.” “Did you grow up in this area?” “We lived in Lakeland but we came over this way a lot to visit my grandparents in Boca Grande.” “Are we going through there?’ “No, we’re already past the turnoff. We should go there sometime, though. It hasn’t changed much, even after they built the bridge.” “The bridge?” “Uh-huh, Boca Grande’s on Gasparilla Island. They built a bridge from the mainland, but when I was a little girl you had to go by ferry, or else take the train. My brother and I did that once when we went alone. In fact, my grandfather was the stationmaster. Today, though, the ferryboats and train station are gone. The only trains that go to the island now are the ones carrying phosphate to the port from Bartow.” They drove through Ft. Myers and into Naples, where they stopped for gas, and then off across the Everglades. “It’s huge,” Alan said, “miles and miles of it, as far as I can see.” “I think that’s part of the problem,” Jill said. “It looks so big that people think nothing can hurt it.” “It looks pretty healthy to me.” “Well, parts of it are but, between the cattle ranches, the sugar cane farms, and encroaching civilization, we’re polluting the hell out of it. On top of that, the farmers, with the help of the Army Corps of Engineers, have been trying to dry it up.” “Why would they do that?” “To control flooding, or in other words, to serve the interests of the agricultural industry. Do you know the Corps actually straightened a river to provide the cattle ranchers with more pasture land.” “They straightened it?” “Yeah. The Kissimmee River used to be a beautiful, meandering river and they turned it into one long ditch. Now it carries a ton a cow shit right into Lake Okeechobee, and from there to what’s left of the Everglades. The sugar farmers add more phosphorus by fertilizing their crops.” “I would think that helps things grow. Isn’t that good?” “The wrong things are growing, though, choking out the native plants. Nature doesn’t need help -- not until humans fuck it up, that is. Besides, sugar’s not good for you.” When they hit U.S. 27, they turned south, then turned onto Krome Avenue, and down U.S. 1, which took them across Florida Bay to Key Largo. The traffic, heavier now as Dade County overflowed into Monroe County for the holiday weekend, alternately slowed to a crawl where the road was two lanes, and then exploded at the passing zones, where some cars flew by the slower ones at speeds in excess of ninety miles an hour. Then, just after Jill had said that they were almost there, traffic came to a complete halt. When, after a few minutes no one honked, Alan got out to take a look. Jill came over to where he was standing and said, “It’s probably just the drawbridge at Jewfish Creek -- shouldn’t be long.” He noticed a couple of guys up ahead playing Frisbee but, before he could say anything, Jill took off toward them at a run and, when the tall bearded man turned to her, she jumped into his arms. Alan’s heart caught in his throat, but then she brought her brother back and introduced them. They shook hands and, though Captain Dan greeted him warmly, Alan could tell he was being appraised. “How come you’re not on the water?” Jill asked. “Serendipity’s outa commission,” he said. “Had to go into Miami for some parts.” “You mean we won’t be able to go diving tomorrow?” “Don’t worry, little sister. If we can stay sober, we’ll get her fixed this afternoon.” A car horn blared and Dan sprinted back to his pick-up, as the line ahead of him began to move. “Don’t stop for lunch,” he hollered. “We’ve got some fresh dolphin.” As they got back in the car Alan said, “Dolphin? These people down here don’t eat dolphin, do they?” “It’s not Flipper, sweetie, it’s a fish. The Spanish call it Dorado, the Hawaiians call it mahi mahi, we call it good eating. The dolphin you’re thinking of is a porpoise; and no, we don’t eat them, they’re protected -- in this country anyway.” # The next morning they headed out to Molasses Reef. In addition to the four of them, there were sixteen divers along for the trip and, after they tied up to a mooring buoy, Janet gave them a talk about the reef. “...don’t bring anything back to the boat,” she added, “unless it’s trash, don’t leave anything, and don’t touch anything.” She got them into the water and then went down with Alan and Jill. The water in the Keys was much prettier than any Alan had ever seen before but, when they settled to the bottom, he felt like Dorothy when she opened the front door of her house after the tornado set it down in Oz. The reef was made up of a variety of hard and soft corals, everything from delicate sea fans to huge brain coral, and held an array of colorful, tropical fish. All around him Alan saw large schools of sergeant majors, yellowtail snapper, and Spanish grunts along with several different kinds of parrotfish, queen and French angels, and even a few barracuda. Janet and Jill watched him take it all in for a few minutes, then each took an elbow and tugged at him to go exploring. They swam in and out of the tongue and groove formation of the reef and saw more. Under one ledge they found a large Nassau grouper and under another a pair of snook. One cavernous hole was filled with thousands of glass minnows and a smaller one held two lobsters. As Janet had predicted, they found one of the most ferocious fish in the ocean, the dusky damsel. Fortunately, they’re no bigger than a silver dollar but, when Jill placed a fin near it, the small fish attacked repeatedly until she pulled her foot away. The damsel then settled down, satisfied that she had protected her territory. Alan found the fire coral all by himself. He had been very careful not to touch anything but, when he backed away from the opening to a cave full of glass minnows, he brushed it with his forearm. It felt like someone had slapped him, hard. Janet saw what had happened and pointed out the culprit. The mustard colored coral was clustered all over the top of a rock, like sets of hands, fingers pressed together as if in prayer. Jill pointed to another rock and then another. He realized the stuff was everywhere and knew he wouldn’t forget what it looked like. It burned a lot but the dive was soon over and, back on the boat, Jill sprinkled the welt with Adolph’s Meat Tenderizer then, with drops of water, she made it into a paste that quickly took most of the pain away. For the second dive, Dan moved the boat a short distance to French Reef. Here they found even more caves and ledges and an equal variety of wildlife. Careful not to touch the sides, Alan peered into one hole where he came face to face with a big, green moray eel. He had marveled at how quickly the fish move underwater, but realized how slow he was when he tried to back away. To make things even more difficult, Jill and Janet were behind him, each straining to look over his shoulders at the eel. When he saw how calm they were, he relaxed and looked again at the moray. It looked back at him, its toothy jaws opening and closing, fierce yet tranquil. Later Janet told him that it was probably five or six feet long and, though he found it hard to believe, she swore they weren’t dangerous. Dan admitted that it might bite you if you stuck your hand in its hole, as people sometimes do when they’re groping around blindly for lobster, but he said stories of them holding on to divers until they run out of air and drown were pure bullshit. On the trip, back Alan sat with Dan at the helm. He was exhausted and yet exhilarated to the point where he couldn’t stop talking about the experience. He drilled Jill’s brother with question after question about the reef, the fish, and diving in general. It was something that he wanted to do again. “I really appreciate your bringing me out here, man. SCUBA diving’s something I’ve always wanted to try, and those reefs were beautiful.” “My pleasure, bro. I like bringing divers out here, especially for their first look. I gotta believe that if we can expose more people to the beauty of the reef and its ecological importance that maybe we can save it from destruction.” “Yeah, Janet told me how some careless boaters drag their anchors over the coral and break off big chunks of it, or even worse run aground on shallow coral heads.” “Well, that’s a problem, but the big threat is from people who never even come out here.” “How’s that?” “Pollutants from land -- mosquito spraying, seeping septic tanks, and agricultural runoff. In addition to tromping all over the reef, we’re poisoning it. Coral will only develop in warm clear waters that are low in phosphate and nitrogen nutrients, and the shit we send out here not only mucks up the water, it aids the growth of algae that smothers the coral. Without sunlight for photosynthesis the coral dies.” “Photosynthesis? I thought coral polyps were animals.” “They are, but there are microscopic plants, called zooxanthellae, that live in the animals’ tissue and create a symbiotic relationship. The plants are protected and feed off the polyps’ waste product, and the polyp uses the energy produced by the plants. Coral reefs are a complex and fragile environment that plays host to a large variety of marine life, and this system that runs from Stuart to the Dry Tortugas is the only one in the Continental United States. If it’s lost, we’re all losers.” Copyright © 2002
Michael D. Kerrigan Purchase Corporate Polytricks:
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