It was just before 5 PM and most of the sunbathers had left the beach. Sally was looking for a few more shells. I was siting on a recliner, watching the waves. More specifically, I was watching someone trying to swim to the shore. I could only see his head. There was a row of buoys a couple of hundred yards out. He(?) was about half way in between. I watched him tack to the left and the right. It looked like he was getting closer, but his progress was painfully slow. And I watched. I had to act. I went up to the guy collecting the towels from the beach. Towels were his mission and he would not be deterred. I ran over to the watersports shop. The two guys saw what I saw. One ran off to find a lifeguard. I went to the shoreline where a few others were also watching the guy. Not seeing a lifeguard, I went into the water. The waves were high, much higher than when Sally and I had been in the ocean a few days earlier. I waded into the water. Chin high, it was time to start swimming. I was about to dive in when I heard Sally screaming from the shore. The other guy at the watersport store must have found binoculars. He was positive that this wasn’t a person. Actually, he thought it could be a large coconut on string, a low-rent second set of buoys.
I learned a valuable lesson – it is ok to risk your life to save a coconut.
Actually, I learned an even more important lesson. There are times when you, me, or one of our friends will jump into action when we see someone in danger. It is too early to know the full details about the death of Alex J. Petti, the VA Hospital ICU nurse from Minneapolis. We do know that he tried to help a woman being jumped by a group of ICE agents. We also know that everything Kristi Noem said about him were lies. But, it is too early to know all of the details.
There is no way to know where ICE agents will turn up next. You may be attending protests. Be careful. You might be simply driving to work one morning and find yourself in the middle of an ICE agent riot. We live in dangerous times. Your first inclination may be to help. Try to assess the risk.
Dave
Picture – Too Tanned To Visit Minneapolis – David L Cunix