I almost lost my daughter last Friday. No, I’m not kidding and no, I don’t mean in the relationship sense. My daughters and I are best friends.
I mean drowning – in the ocean – in Jamaica.
It was really weird, because from the moment she told me she was going to Jamaica with friends, I felt unease. That is really not like me – normally I would say Wow! Great! Have a fantastic time! But something was just nagging at me …
Fortunately for me, she told me the story after she came home, knowing that would be the best way for me.
It all started with a trip to the beach.
She and one of the girls had been out on the catamaran on Thursday and had the most beautiful experience, that when they went back to the beach on Friday, they cajoled their third friend into accompanying them, even though she was fairly adamant that she didn’t want to go. The sky was sunny and clear, except for a little darkness far away towards the other side of the island.
About 5 minutes into the trip, the wind started kicking up and the guide attempted to turn the catamaran back to shore — without success. He then had the bright idea for all of them to go to one side of the thing to give him the leverage to turn. As the waves were kicking up, a good-size wave came up under the catamaran and dumped them all into the ocean. Nicole and Amy were freaking out at first, trying to swim toward the boat. The guide yelled for them to stay away from the boat, and in an instant they found out why – it violently righted inself and took off like a shot. There they were – out in the ocean – not even able to see land.
As the boat took off, Nicole and Amy became instantly calm, knowing that there was nothing good that would come from being hysterical. After all, they both are moms of three and have seen hysterical up close and personal. Now, in case you’re wondering why I’m not mentioning friend #3, she was hysterical the entire time and that’s all I’m going to say about that.
The guide at this point didn’t seem very worried and told them to all hold hands – that he was sure someone would have seen the boat flip and would send a rescue boat for them.
It was at that point the guide, whose name was Patrick, started to peer down into the water, looking around. When Nicole asked him what he was looking for, he told her his face was getting dried out from the salt water and he was just getting it wet. Kindly of weird since by now they were in the middle of a full-fledged thunder, lightening, pouring rain and violent waves type of storm.
So there they bobbed, getting dunked constantly by the waves, being force-fed salt water by the ocean and trying to remain calm. About what seemed like 15 minutes or so into the ordeal when they didn’t see any boats, Patrick wasn’t looking very assured at all. He wasn’t hysterical, but I believe the phrase “he looked scared shitless” may have been used.
After Amy and Nicole tried to sing for awhile (Row, row, row, your boat – where the hell are the boats?), they realized that they were being pulled farther and farther out to sea. If they caught a good wave and were lifted up, they could see land – not their beach, but what looked like a small island in the distance. Nicole and Amy decided to swim toward the island, even though they knew they would not be able to make it. Patrick was telling them – no! stay here! But at that point they didn’t think bobbing in the middle of the ocean was the best plan either. They started swimming in the direction of the island, with friend #3 in tow, and Patrick following.
You’re probably wondering about the boats. Well, they did see the boats and tried to yell for them, realizing they were just wasting their strength because the boats looked like little dots and of course couldn’t hear them. And there was a lifeguard on the beach that did see the boat flip over and immediately ran for a wave runner. Another wave runner and two other boats followed and were looking for them the whole time. It’s a very big ocean, however …
Long story short(er), a guy on one of the boats noticed “birds” flapping in the distance and wondered what the heck they were doing in the middle of a storm. Yep! That was them! When Amy and Nicole were finally deposited into one of the boats, it ran out of gas at which point Nicole yelled “Are you kidding? You rescued us in a boat that didn’t have gas?”
No, I’m not kidding – you just can’t make this stuff up! So they were told to jump into the other boat as the boats were violently being smacked together, and they made the 20-minute boat ride back to shore.
Patrick finally confessed to looking in the water for man-o-wars which can wrap around your legs, causing painful stinging, numbness in the limb and respiratory distress. Nice. I would have been thinking sharks, but what do I know?
I can’t possibly tell this story as humorously as Nicole can (because I’m still trying to find the humor in it), but I did manage to laugh while she was telling it – she has an amazing sense of humor (husband and 3 kids – I guess she has to).
Talk about seeing what’s truly important in your life. I always try not to sweat the small stuff – and I think I’m very good at it. But this was not small stuff …
I hope I never ever have to go through what millions of mothers have gone through – because this close call was as close as I ever want to get.
Nickey Hollenbach Personal Touch Concierge Service, LLC http://www.ptconciergeservice.com
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