The Bottle

His breath filled and left his lungs like the crashing surf  in front of him.  Luminescent foam and seaweed tickled his toes as he sat on the edge of the Gulf of Mexico. He was pondering his life.  No answers had come so far.

The moon had given up on him hours ago and gone to bed, leaving him in the thick inky blackness of the humid Gulf Coast night.  The white sand of the beach marked the path back to his condo.  But he wasn’t taking it. He exhaled fully, feeling an ache in his ribs. And his heart.

Another breath. Another wave. Ebb and flow.

A shooting star, screaming to its fiery death, illuminated the Gulf.  The man looked up and made a wish.  “Wishing on a meteorite,” he thought, “how ridiculous.”  But that was what his life had become, “ridiculous.”

Another wave crashed at his feet. The rhythmic beat of the incoming surf calmed his nerves.  He refused to drink.  “There are better ways to get through this,” he correctly thought.  This was his medicine.

The man had lost his job.  His industry had died and left him an orphan.  He scoffed in anger — but no one out here would have heard it.  Nor would have they have cared.  Like a sandcastle built on this very beach, his career had been easily washed away.  He was frequently angry these days.

Another breath. And another wave.

THUMP! The man’s self-pity was broken by a glass bottle hitting his foot.  He looked around and grabbed the bottle.  It was old. Very old.  And had a piece of weathered paper inside of it.  The man looked around and pulled out the cork. Pop.  He fished out the paper with his right index finger.  He looked down in his bifocals to read what faded words said:

GET OFF THIS BEACH.  THIS BOTTLE DIDN’T FALL INTO YOUR HANDS BECAUSE IT WAS SITTING STILL.  LIKE WINSTON CHURCHILL SAID, “If you’re going through hell, keep going.”  CHANGE HAPPENS. YOU CAN’T SIT THERE AND MOPE ABOUT IT. YOU HAVE TO KEEP UP.

The startled man looked around, at the yellowed paper and then back at the Gulf.  A second shooting star screamed past, right near the path of the first. The man stood up, dusted off his rear, folded the paper and put it back into the bottle. He then threw it back as far into the sea as he could.  It needed to save more lives. And so did he.