Something's Afoot...and Happily So

There is something sacred about shared ground, about knowing that someone you love has walked this same path, warmed their toes in the same ancient sands and waters.  That’s why I wasn’t even jealous last night while listening about my friends’ recent adventures in Cancun.  Well, maybe I was a wee bit envious. . .

It’s been almost ten years since my family headed to Mexico, settling along the shores of Isla de Mujeres, a half-hour boat ride from booming Cancun.  It was there where the Holts baptized ourselves in turquoise waters, swam among Crayola-colored fish, observed our first topless bather.  And it was there where a pudgy, young Eric Holt swam with a nurse shark, despite his fears of drinking the water at the local restaurant.  

Last night, it was that nurse shark that bridged yesterday and today.  My friend mentioned a side trip to a local island, charming and slow-paced, that was punctuated by the opportunity to swim with a shark.  That’s when I knew we had walked the same shores, separated by a thousand high tides, but tied to that very place, nonetheless.

Why is it that we are comforted by knowing our friends have “been there,” too?  Maybe, in spite of the Internet’s “shrink wrap” tendencies, the world is still a vast and mysterious place.  Maybe, such shared experiences--even when shared at different times--confirm that there is, in fact, such a magical place out there.  That the waters really were that color.  That it wasn’t just us.

Honestly, when I think about the vastness of outerspace, I am not bothered by the “just us-ness” of it all.  But, somehow, I need to know that, here on earth, at least, we are connected to each other, and that those connections are anything but tenuous or discountable.  It matters that, last weekend, my friends stood on the very Mexican shore a hundred yards from where my family stayed a decade ago.  

Like thumbtacks lovingly pressed into the cork board, our shared footprints are our declarations that, like Kilroy, “I was here.”  We anchor each other--and ourselves--when we walk these common paths, no matter how far we are from home.