I am not a morning person, dragging my ass out of bed to make coffee for my fiancé and me on a freezing cold Monday morning in November, that and the urgent need for a pee is the best I can do before I retreat to the welcoming warmth of our bed puffing away on a much needed rollup.
Chaos is normal in our household on a school day, grumpy bleary eyed children search vaguely for uniforms they gleefully cast aside the previous day. Our German Sheppards, indifferent to our very existence at most other times greet us with manic abandon as if we had been missing for weeks. Phones ring and televisions spew trivia and news reports or the cartoon network depending on the room your in.
We open Pandora’s Box every morning and today something different came out.
I have never seen a whale before and I am forty years old, Well ok yes I have seen loads of them on television over the years and in books I have even heard them singing on those new age relaxation tapes so I know they exist, but not in the flesh, never up close and personal. I have never questioned the existence of whales as I have that of aliens, yetis the loch ness monster, father Christmas and God, never even doubted the fact that they are out there somewhere swimming the great oceans, but I shore as hell had some doubts that crispy Monday morning when my beloveds highly excitable ten year old son ran into our bedroom in a state of high excitement with news relayed from a mobile phone call of a sixty foot whale on Appely beach.
We live in Ryde on the Isle of Wight the Solent is a stones throw (well almost) from our back door and is one of the busiest strips of water in the world. I guess what I am trying to say is a sixty foot whale being on a beach just along the road is about as likely as Bill Gates knocking on our front door and asking to borrow a windows `98 start up disk.
I was not touched by the tremendous enthusiasm exhibited by said small boy and mother alike but somehow I found myself forgoing coffee and bed and racing down stairs to catch up as the 4x4 was already turning over in the drive.
We arrived moments later (minus a teenage daughter already embarked for school, a teenage son who loves his bed even more than I do and with the addition of a somewhat bemused work colleague of my partner picked up on route) outside the lifeboat station at Appely beach which forms part of Ryde sands. But apart from a few early morning dog walkers there was no sign of a whale. You would notice something that big wouldn’t you? It would stand out so to speak.
Yes my scepticism was growing and I could not be persuaded to leave the vehicle and ask complete strangers in such a normal setting if they might possibly know the whereabouts of a leviathan of the deep. Yeah right! Had to leave that to a believer amongst our small party and yes it was my prospective partner in life. I sat and watched her questioning two ruddy faced folk wrapped well against the November chill whilst their happily panting pooches sniffed the salt air and each other.
I couldn’t help but sink down in my seat a little like an embarrassed teenager being picked up from the school gates by a mad aunty.
Luckily for me I did not give voice to my misgivings as it seemed the beast was indeed real and was recumbent at Puckpool further along the coast, a short stroll along the sea wall, somewhat further by road.
On the drive toward Puckpool I was reminded that the closest I had come to an actual whale was as a kid visiting Blackgang chine amusement park perched on the cliffs at the southern tip of the island. There was an eighty five foot long whale skeleton in the entrance hall, you could walk along inside its rib cage reading the graffiti carved into the ancient bones.
I have since discovered that it was the skeleton of a Fin whale, stranded off the island in the 1880`s and installed at Blackgang by the parks creator as one of the first attractions.
We parked up outside the gates of Puckpool Park and walked the short distance along the road toward the sea wall. I zipped up my coat against the cold and rolled a cigarette whilst I ambled along. The small blonde apple of my beloveds eye ran ahead, groups of people standing about by the sea wall indicated that something out of the ordinary was happening ahead of us, abruptly the quiet reverence of those gathered was interrupted by our boy loudly exclaiming “ Bloody hell look at the size of it”. Red tape fluttered in the face numbing onshore breeze. we moved forward to mingle with the crowd, all the brass monkeys had stayed at home dead whales were not enough reason for them to risk frozen balls whereas I had given up any ideas of a lay in. A footpath closed sign had been placed across the sea wall and another hastily written in chalk proclaimed health warning disease risk do not approach.
Everyone was ignoring it including me to walk on to the beach and get a view of the huge carcass that lay there on the shingle.
It was probably only about thirty five feet in length but still a massive animal. A Fin whale as I learned later capable of living for up to sixty years and travelling all the worlds deep oceans, this one had suffered appalling injuries either before or after death I do not know which. People approached it in ones and twos some with camera phones held up. I circled around the length of the body slowly a silent witness, down on the wet sand I paused to look down and realise I was standing in blood. Walking back up the shingle on the opposite side I began to catch the overpowering stench of decay I noticed others covering their mouths, as I walked up to the seawall I saw a lady walking away in the arms of her husband clearly and visibly distressed.
When I was a ten year old boy I would not have doubted for a moment that the whale was there, a chance to miss some school and have an adventure. I was full of bravado poking sticks at dead cats and recklessly jumping out of trees. But now at forty I am full of doubts afraid of looking stupid, unsure of how I am supposed to act and feel. Unsure of myself, discomforted and reminded of my own mortality by a dead whale on a beach.
End
Hi all I felt the need to share this with you, it happened on monday being sober is far from boring for me and i can even string my thoughts together and get them down on paper.
Hey Badger, Thanks again for a great share. I was standing right there at Puckpool, shaking, chilled to the bone, disgustingly sick at my stomach, maveling at the size of the whale. What a sad end to it's life, but an experience those who witnessed it will never forget. The little lad will have this memories to tell his friends and someday grandchildren. Good for you , not staying in the warm toasty house, drinking coffee. As I've said before , you have a gift, thanks for sharing it.
Well, I haven't said it before.. hehe.. that was, indeed very well written, and shared with us feeling and indeed, almost being there with you. Thank you so much. I'm glad you were sober and went out in spite of your doubts. I hope someday you get to see a healthy live whale. They are beautiful and so graceful in the water.
love in recovery,
amanda
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do your best and God does the rest, a step at a time
Your are totally correct though, death is sometimes not a good sight.
On a very serious point though. Seeing a dead animal should'nt make you think about your own mortality. Do you think like that when you see a bacon butty or a steak?? (Profuse apologies if you are a vegitarian).
Every thing that has life has to die.( If not, the world would be still full of dinosaurs) Death is not the end, it is the gate to the next stage of existance. Belief in an afterlife is a totally personal view.
I never believed in a life after death until I started watching the TV programme 'Most Haunted' The Ghosthunters. I thought that it was just a bit of fun.
Then I tried using similar equipment, more scientific methods and less screaming, to investigate some 'haunted locations'.
3 years later, I am TOTALLY convinced that the end of the physical body is NOT the end of the existance of the person / soul.
The people I work with (At a funeral home) have told me that sometimes they have seen a 'shade' standing next to a visitor in the chapel.
Life continues.......
Well done to you for dragging yourself from the bed to go on the adventure with the kids, that's a sign that you are a good parent.
Keep up with the good work my friend.
Best wishes
Chris.
-- Edited by Cabbageheadchris at 13:51, 2005-11-25
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"Computer games don't affect kids; I mean if Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened rooms, munching magic pills and listening to repetitive electronic music." -- Kristian Wilson, Nintendo, Inc, 1989"
thanks guys for your positive words, our local weekly came out today with a front page header and photo proclaiming " Death of a Giant" and it would seem in my doubtfulness I underestimated the size, it was infact 54 ft` long not 35 as I guessed it.
Hey Chris, lol no im not a veggie, and dont worry im not getting maudlin over my own eventual demise, i have a secret plan to out live you all, it involves sticky back plastic and pipe cleaners...Doh! that was supposed to be a secret.....mutter..mutter
end to it's life, but an experience those who witnessed it will never forget. The little lad will have this memories to tell his friends and someday grandchildren. Good for you , not staying in the warm toasty house, drinking coffee. As I've said before , you have a gift, thanks for sharing it.
