The Jetty & The Seagull

I really had to get out of the house this weekend. I had to get out of the city. Just didn’t have a great feeling about being home.  I ended up booking a room and grabbing a ticket for an event for Saturday. My buddy Tommy was going to be playing at the club at Ocean, so I figured, “why not?” After a terrible Saturday, finally just got my stuff together and head out. The traffic in and around Philly didn’t help much, but then I got into Jersey and on the expressway. Just dark and fast. Some music helped bring up my spirits as I got closer. I stopped in Brigantine to see Chrissy and her decorations. Warm outside. Inviting. It was good to see some decorations since I don’t have any up. I just think of so many years you spent decorating our house, all the ceramic pieces, all the stockings, all the stuff on our fake tree. Ha. You always made it a magical time for us despite anything you had to overcome. I am impressed with people who are also on this journey of losing a parent that can just continue to be upbeat and positive. It is not easy for me. I’ve seen others go the other way as well. Whether it be a parent or a sibling, this type of loss, it remains inside you. It’s there when you wake up, it’s there while you’re working, its there when you go to sleep. I had a great time out Saturday night. I really just tried to enjoy a small group of friends and music. I really just tried to enjoy people enjoying life, enjoying music and letting their worries go for a few hours. Not realizing to think at the time, but now thinking about that crowd, a good percentage of them have also experienced some type of loss or tragedy. Everyone is going through something. We are no different. After watching my friend play an amazing amount of music, I walked the empty and cold boardwalk back to my hotel. It was peaceful and serene. I could hear waves crashing only a few 100 feet from me and the darkness of the unknown. Went back to my room and called it a night and asleep by about 2. I woke up and I felt sleepy, but I saw some sun and I could see the ocean from my room and that was really my only goal aside getting something to eat. Instead of a quick grab and go, I decided to sit and have breakfast. I just sat alone and had some breakfast at a little spot in the hotel off the boards. I imagined so many times we had a nice breakfast. Either you cooked or we went out or something. I remember that most of the time I would ever eat with you or near you, I just remained silent. I don’t know why I would do this, but just gazing somewhere. I guess either into my life or what I was around. Just enjoying the slowness of life and the moment. I can always see you before we went to the Coffee Station that time. I think it was around your birthday. You got emotional cause you thought something happened after I took too long in the Wawa. So I had a nice breakfast, then a call with a buddy about the night before and then just shut down and walked over the guardrails and onto the beach. I took out a pair of my shorts to sit on. I sat there for a while. I just kept thinking, “this is where you really are….” You are not in Folcroft. Not Darby. Not Philly. You’re at the beach. You’re near the ocean. The place you loved. The place you felt safe. The place you had so many good memories at. Then I got up and walked on to the jetty. There were no birds in the sky except for one lone seagull. It wasn’t flying all around, but it was hovering in one location at the end of the jetty. A pure white seagull. Sometimes it would fly towards me. I truly felt that in some way you were around. Enjoying the salt air, sun piercing through the gray and white clouds, the seagull hung around me for as long as I was on the jetty. I had a few moments that were just uncontrollable. A lot of, “hoping”. A lot of “I wish I could’ve done more for you…” A few regrets that I couldn’t get you to the place you dreamed of. The cold salt air brushing against the tears; salt versus salt…made me feel better. I know that no one is going to make any of this alright. They really can’t. It is literally like paddling through endless oncoming waves trying to get out to that calm where we can wait. I just keep thinking you’ll be back some day. I wish we spent more time when we were together just enjoying life and not worrying about things that are absolutely a joke now. I wish we never had to deal with any of the drama you faced. God. It almost seems so small that I can view it as pathetic on many levels. Life is meant to be enjoyed. I don’t care if you’re here for a day or 100 years. I know you were always chasing your “happy” and in that desire to be happy, you made so many happy around you. We sure do miss your bellowing laughs and your funny comments. Like setting yourself on fire trying to blow your candles out. Such a special video Lisa captured we will have forever. I am so thankful we lived in an age where we could create so many memories that will live on forever. I will be able to let my kids hear your voice. I will be able to show Ace your beautiful message to Kane on the beach. I will be able to remember all the time we spent up at Newport really enjoying the best that life has to offer. Most of all I will be able to just enjoy the person you were inside my heart. That’s where you will live forever and no one can take that away from me. I hope somewhere I discover some cache of pictures or videos that I have not yet uncovered. That would be great. I just thought we had so much more time together Mom. I would’ve snapped you every time I saw you had I had some kind of warning about what was to come. We had no warning. No notice. So I will continue to go out on the jetty and speak to you. Some day you may be able to speak back. And maybe someday that seagull will fly south for the winter. I just hold on to hope that you are truly happy where you are and that love surrounds you every day up there like I hope you know how much we loved you down here. Bobby