Safe Harbor | An Ode to 18 1/2

"But there you had one more small but significant

 enigma of Sullivans Island, a land washed in

 mystery and populated with the kind of characters

Tennessee Williams would have loved to have known."

 -  Dorthea Bennton Frank

Everyone has a holy place, a refuge... A place

where their heart is instantly lighter

their mind clearer, 

Where they feel closer to God

 or love or truth or whatever it is they happen to believe in.

 Mine was discovered here in Charleston,

  through my sister gypsy soul, Stephanie Patton-- 

we'll say it's a little something borrowed. 

I have come to realize in my twenties that we exalt what is at hand...

For instance, as a child, my holy place was Massena, New York's Eisenhower Locks. 

It was special to me.. 

In my "nautical expertise", and if childhood memory serves me correctly, 

when a ship enters a lock, water is either fed in or drained out depending on whether

 the ship is bound up river or down. 

Once the amount of water is leveled, the ship may exit and sail on. 

Eisenhower Locks, Massena NY

 Had I grown up beside the ocean, not a river,  I might  not have mythologized it -- and chosen something  more brilliant. 

But I had to discover my holy place upon moving here, as Charleston is the "Holy City"-- and oddly enough, my new safe harbor remains 

somewhat the same... it still sustains seaside.

 No matter what way you look at it, my True North points to

 station 18 1/2 on Sullivans Island.  

You cannot help but have a spiritual awakening, a peaceful calming or just catch your breath when you see a sunrise like this-- 

Morning sunrise- Sullivan's Island

Built in 1962, this automated lighthouse is adjacent to

 Fort Moultrie and steers mariners, whilst in dense fog

 or dark nights, away from cliffs, land and shorelines, 

coral reefs and other potentially hazardous areas. 

It also steers us wondering souls to it's side for

 solace and comfort. 

The Boys love going to 18 1/2 with mama. It's our bonding time... 

and the first place I ever was able to get Willy in the water (yes, I have the one Newfie that loathes the water!) 

They both just smile when we're there... it's our special place together.

Willy Wanka is all smiles!

Mama and Willy

That's how I know that this lighthouse is special.

 It was one of  my unexplained gravitational pulls to Charleston.

Little baby 210 pound Chaucer

Willy (left) and Chaucer (Right)

Writers love to illustrate with words the beauty of Charleston.

 Sullivan's Island was the home of Edgar Allen Poe for a wee bit.

He wrote "Goldbug Island" about SI and they pay tribute to him 

with a perfectly situated beachside bar, Poe's Tavern

Other writers, like Dorthea Benton Frank, Sullivan's Island native, 

have written a plethora of novels (New York Times Bestsellers) 

about Sullivans, Charleston and the Low-Country. 

 "She took a deep breath and  she could still smell

 plough mud, which was an acquired taste

 and dangerously addictive. In her dreams she actually

 smelled plough mud. It's what the Low-country  is made of."

My first Plough mud experience

Sipping on Champagne under the star blanketed sky,

 the lighthouse's unique flashing

 characteristic

 (0.2 second flash, a 4.8 flash, a 4.8 second eclipe,

 another 0.2 second flash and a 24.8 second eclipse) 

soothes and excited me.

 It is here that I can clearly see the North Star... 

Apparently
 it is an inherent flaw of us mortals
 to be drawn to what abandons us,

 and to what seems most likely to abandon is. 

I challenge that..

18 1/2 can be seen for 26 miles.

It can withstand the strongest of winds, time and storm.

I say we're defined by what embraces us... 

what guides us home, whatever that may be.

Whether it lifts us safely into new, unchartered waters like the locks,
 or it's

our candle on the water (childhood reference to Pete's Dragon - mom).. 

hard working, diligent, unwavering... constant.

Sailors have often referred to lighthouses

 as their seaside stars, especially from those that shifted

 from celestial to terrestrial navigation.  

I learned this from a "local" at the fish market I buy the pups' food from.

He loves giving my "Yankee butt" some "Old Salt" knowledge.

He's rather funny, too,  and somewhat like a fortune cookie -- 

but in a stinky fish mart on Shem Creek.

The other day I walked in and he said

- "It is the calm and silent water that drowns a man..."

"Well, he shoulda worn a life-vest, then.."

 I joked back.

He shook his head and mumbled under his breath, 

"No matter how treacherous the sea may be,

 a woman will always be more so,"

and  then gave me an old-man sailor's wink.

That same fortune-cookie Captain comes to mind sometimes
 when I am at the beach alone and staring up at the palmetto crescent moon. 

 As the sweet champagne hits my lips,

 the tide reaches my toes, 

and the lighthouse makes it's way back around,
I feel a calming in my soul.

I know, at that moment
 what Dom Pierre Perignon, the Benedictine Monk 
who invented champagne (Cheers to you, Brother Bubbly) meant when he said---

"I am tasting the stars"

"So we beat on,

 boats against the current,

 borne back ceaselessly into the past."

The Great Gatsby | F. Scott Fitzgerald