On the Beach

Joe and I saw a terrible thing one Saturday at the beach. A man who had been diving off a friend’s shoulders into the shallow water was suddenly being carried up onto the sand by five people. They set him down and he didn’t move. Within a minute the body was surrounded by people from that section of beach, wet and dry, child and adult. The lifeguards blew whistles, and soon cops arrived. “Move back!” they kept saying for awhile, then gave up and talked with one another. We all waited for an ambulance to arrive.

The man had landed on his head and could only move his fingers, nothing else below his neck. A few of the cops asked him questions and wrote things down. Meanwhile, the tide was coming in. Twice the guards had to move the paralyzed man further up the sand to keep the ocean off him. For some reason, throughout the ordeal he had an erection, unavoidably conspicuous beneath his tight shorts.

I was watching the episode from a little distance, and between myself and the injured man was a girl who was also lying on her back, as motionless as him. But she was simply sunning. Despite so much shrieking of whistles just yards away she didn’t open her eyes. I guess the noise all went in with the smashing of waves, or maybe she was asleep, but either way she seemed unaware that as she painted her body, a man practically beside her was saying goodbye to his. She finally sat up to check how lovely she was becoming and saw the crowd standing almost on top of her. She looked at the activity for awhile, frowning in a puzzled way. She didn’t speak to anyone. Finally she adjusted the straps of her swimsuit and lay back down.

Off in the water people continued to flounder happily, sometimes diving from another person’s shoulders.

At last, after 45 minutes, an ambulance crew arrived. They took the man with the cracked neck away. The crowd dispersed and it was just a normal beach again, people trying to laugh louder than the sea.

Joe and I left the beach about the same time. I felt odd having seen a man’s life wrecked, but I thought the worst danger was past: the man was on his way to a hospital, away from the chaos of the waves and spectators at last. I would be feeling better now if I were him.

But after the long walk to our car, as we drove out of the little beach town, we saw the ambulance that had come much too late. It should have been a long ways gone by then, but it was parked outside the local police station. The medics were doing something with equipment near an open door.

The man’s ordeal, the suspense of not knowing what could be done for him and what could not be done, was being prolonged.

A young man walked past the ambulance, his radio playing loudly. ~ Letter to Linda Beaver and Charlie J., March 5, 1988