“The porch lights need to stay off,” the innkeeper implores at the quaint oceanside bed and breakfast in Tybee Island, Georgia.
“We love our sea turtles and don’t want them to get hit by any cars!” I listen and nod.
She punctuates her porch side welcome spiel with this explanation, “They cross the street to mate, thinking this is moonlight.”
I follow her inside, up oaken stairs to my room where she reveals two robes behind the door, “In case you don’t come back alone.”
A solo traveler and teacher just done with summer school in New York City, I long for a sun kissed face, not moonlight assignations.
The next day, just off the beach, summer heat presses me to find air-conditioning. As a gust of cool greets me and perspiration drives down the back of my legs, I open the door to the Tybee Science Center.
“Am I dressed okay to come in?” The tall and full-bodied clerk with green-washed blond hair, thick silver bike chain necklaces, white t-shirt and cut off jean shorts nods, “Yes” and sells me a ticket.
The place isn’t that big. I take a staircase to rocking chairs that overlook the ocean through slatted windows. I take sips of water from the bottle the inn keeper gave me with a reminder, “Stay hydrated.” Standing up, embarrassed my coverup is on inside out, I make my way down to the shark exhibit where I see an egg and ask one of the staff, “Do sharks carry their babies or lay eggs?” “You know, I am not sure,” she says.
In the basement, Ike awaits. The staff person explains that Ike will be released soon, and how sea turtle moms lay their eggs and then swim away, never looking back. When the babies hatch, they make a solo journey across the wide Sargasso Sea until they find a safe place, but some get lost along the way and end up on the Tybee shore. “Do they swim with siblings?” I want to know. “No, they are solitary creatures,” the guide explains. This makes sense to me –they travel inside their homes.
This makes me think about my first mother, who gave me up for adoption, and how she swam forward without me, and I without her. Though on vacation, I never escape adoption—an ever-present inner fanbelt.
Re-hydrated, I inquire about the restroom. The bathroom trailer is outside, and all the stalls are broken, so I head to the public bathrooms by the outdoor North Grill and stay for lunch. When the bartender’s young and friendly eyes catch mine, I say, “I’ll try the crab and asparagus salad, sweet potato fries, and a Bloody Mary, too, please.” A brunette with green eyes sits on the stool to the right of me, and a man soon cozies up next to her. A basket of sweet potato waffle fries appears before me. I pop one down. More follow into my mouth, going down like chocolates. “These are the devil in the form of a sweet potato,” I tell the bartender. “Balsamic, honey, cinnamon. Aren’t they good?” he smiles. The couple next to me starts to playfully bicker.
“It’s our anniversary,” the wife says to me.
I hear the slap of a wallet next to my fries. A handsome man with sandy hair and a blonde well-trimmed beard sits down. I’m saved from the happy couple.
“Would you like some of my fries?” I offer.
“Sure, I take food from strangers,” he quips and adds, “I usually don’t eat sweet potato fries.”
“Regular ones are so good,” I reply.
“I know,” he says and biting into a sweet potato waffle fry he confirms what I know, “These are good.” Before I respond or ask a question he asks, “Where your people from?”
“New York City, Western New York State originally.”
“You?”
“Nashville but my dad was from Harrison, New York, adopted.” I know this town; it’s a suburb of the city. The specificity of his answer surprises me.
“Harrison is posh,” I say.
“He was adopted by a doctor and his wealthy family.”
“I was adopted, too,” I add. We look at each other, our heads tilted.
“I’m Carrie Anne, by the way, what’s your name?”
“Earl.” We shake hands.
“Sorry my fingers are sticky from the fries.”
“That’s okay,” Earl says.
The space we share becomes an incubator for strangers drawn together by empty seats at a beach bar. He tells me how his dad was sent to military school and was injured during a drill and added that his dad’s commanding officer was a former United States president who was tough; the drill is no longer done. His dad left military school, following the injury, and traveled south where he met and romanced his mom. My eye contact is a loom. He keeps spinning this family yarn.
His dad left his mom, shortly after she bore him and his twin, and in 2019 when the pandemic dawned, his father was found alone and dead in the streets of Nashville. I don’t interject my adoption story. Instead, I lean in. His dad had artistic talents and people who were kind to artists gave Earl’s dad shelter in downtown Nashville from time to time. After he was found dead, the good Samaritans had some of his belongings: poems, song lyrics, a coin collection, so they tracked Earl down to return his dad’s belongings to family.
“When I got that, it felt like I knew him,” he says. My eyes fill with empathy for him and his dad. What I think but don’t say is that his dad kept re-enacting his initial abandonment in life, most likely traveling keelless, not sure where he was from and where he was headed.
My thoughts populate with literary associations. Edgar Allan Poe, an adoptee kicked out of military school, also died in the streets alone, but instead of sharing this, I tell him about Nick Flynn’s memoir, “Another Bullshit Night in Suck City” and how his dad ended up in a homeless shelter where he was working.
“I don’t believe in hanging onto stuff,” Earl shares. I infer he’s speaking about feelings.
“It’s okay to pause and unpack what you’re carrying.” I suggest.
In the absence of a response from him I continue, “For me there’s a difference between being tough and strong. Anyone can be tough but strength requires bravely picking at a scar so it can ooze and clean out.” Earl isn’t swayed.
“Resilience, bouncing back matters,” my last thought on this topic.
“Yes, that’s a good word, resilience,” he replies.
Earl orders a sixteen-ounce Red Stripe, “Only two dollars,” he says to me when he cracks it open.
I take a sip of my Bloody Mary, thinking of my maternal sister, because we both ordered Bloody Mary’s at our first in person meeting in 2009 at a revolving restaurant in Atlanta, Georgia where she said, “Our mom likes Bloody Mary’s, one of her favorites.” Our biological mother was absent from this first meeting and has remained absent and silent since I first contacted her in 2005. At this moment, I receive a text from my sister. She’s checking in from her vacation in Belfast, Ireland where she’s traveling with her husband and seven-year-old soon to be eight-year old daughter, my niece. They’ve just visited the Titanic Museum. I turn my attention back to Earl and decide to say one more thing about adoption.
“Your dad kept re-enacting the abandonment he endured; sounds like he abandoned himself.” Earl changes the topic, sharing that he is camping nearby and how he didn’t sleep well because he was struggling with his tent zipper.
“Can’t you get a brand like Coleman or something?” I kid.
“Yeah, I should get something good,” he agrees.
“You deserve a good zipper. My version of toughing it is eating whatever they place before me each morning at the bed and breakfast.”
“We’ve covered a lot,” he says with a smile. Thinking about the sea turtle story I heard earlier, I ask, “Did you know that sea turtle moms don’t look back after they lay their eggs?” He does.
“Five or six years ago my girlfriend and I, ex-girlfriend, were walking down the beach with red headlights on when we saw footprints that looked like sea turtle prints. We decided to follow and saw a momma lay and bury her eggs.”
“She just left?” I clarify.
“Yes, but she took her time and great care. She really buried those eggs,” he explained moving his arm back and forth, imitating the momma’s fin.
I think of my first, biological mom, and how, like a sea turtle, she stays in her home. According to my sister, she rarely ventures out. Our mother knows about me, but she doesn’t speak to me. She gave birth to me and left. Knowing my maternal sister, has helped me feel less solitary in life. Though we came from the same mother, one who refuses to acknowledge our sisterhood. After a lifetime of bonding with the family that raised me, searching and reuniting with blood family that I click with, I, unlike my first mother, do venture out, but often do so alone.
Earl sits up and takes a cigarette out of a plastic Ziplock bag where he keeps his keys. He goes to have a smoke, leaves the bag behind to hold his spot, and takes his wallet. When he’s gone less than one minute, the clerk who greeted me at the science center plunks herself down.
Meekly I say, “Someone is sitting there.”
The bartender tells her, “Someone is sitting there. He went for a smoke.” She remains. The bartender tells her he needs to see identification.
“She works at the museum over there, “I say.
“Yea, gotta’ go to my shift at the grocery story now,” she voices and tells the bartender, “I’ll have a PBR.”
As he puts the PBR in front of her, he says, “You might have to move when he gets back.” She still doesn’t budge.
Earl returns and sees her in his seat. “I didn’t defend your real estate well,” I say apologetically.
“I was sitting here,” Earl says. She still doesn’t budge.
“Guess I’ll move down,” he says. He greets a newcomer at the bar, a man who sits next to him in his new seat. I eat another sweet potato waffle fry, leaving some behind and walk over to Earl to say goodbye.
“I have a feeling, a good feeling that everything will work out for you,” I offer as my farewell, a tender touch.
“Bye baby, take care,” he says. We hug.
Wandering through new streets, I wonder why my conversation with Earl was blocked by the science museum ticket seller? The warmth that hovered above us—did she save me from false moonlight? The story he shared felt like it was meant for me to hear. Though traveling on my own, I’m not Earl’s dad or Edgar Allen Poe, adoptees who died tragically and alone.
***
Back in New York City, friend requests pop up on my social media, not from Earl. The requests are from a maternal sibling who doesn’t yet know about me. My sister texts to explain what is happening. In the middle of watching the movie “Titanic,” my niece blurted out that she has another aunt. The truth is out. This woman, essentially my youngest maternal sister, finds out that her mother was pregnant as a teenager and gave up the baby, never to look back. I am this baby, grown, now middle-aged.
Shocked, this maternal sibling finds me on Instagram and reaches out to me on Messenger. I do my best to chat with her, but she has nothing kind to say. She blows up in ways that scare me. She’s angry at her older sister for not telling her about me, and alleges I stole her sister away from her. She wishes us both harm. She rages at my first mother, unable to see her bravery and what and who she left behind. She like the ticket seller, tries to block me from warmth in my life.
I go into my shell, taking down social media. Enraged, she contacts the family that raised me, getting revenge for how I contacted her family. I advise my family to block her, to not respond. I think back to Ike at Tybee Island. Truth releases me. I paddle onward.
Photo by Marcus Dall Col on Unsplash
