Narcissus, the Pre-Oil Gaze (Glaze)

My second morning in Destin was oil free. I had taken care of the fishing license the day prior and subconsciously programmed myself to get up at daybreak. (Can anyone else do this?) I made my way down to an empty beach, an empty expanse of ocean that was crystal clear, calm as glass, an awaiting my exploitation. My ancient lover was beckoning me across the expanse of time and I was ever-so anxious to dip a line.

When I have a line in the water, I become a different person -- some dug-up mystical relic of a time long past. They say that early men were divided between hunters and gatherers. If I believed in past lives, I'd say I was neither... maybe some village shaman with magic stick and twine that conjured up healing fillets for the tribe. When I fish, I experience a level of being with the world that I find in few other places. I can hear Chevy Chase not so much telling me "Be the ball, Danny," but instead hear his "chun-na-na-num" of transcendence in each crank of my reel. I am not good at too many things, but I am an excellent fisherman, trained by one of the best in my father. (Happy Father's Day, dad!)

So as I stood in the surf of the Gulf of Mexico, I didn't know whether or not I would catch fish. I only knew that if there were fish to catch anywhere in the vicinity, they belonged to me. After snagging a few ladyfish, I started to notice a school of large redfish swimming through. Quickly, I changed baits.

Power erupted from the calm surface of the water like electricity in my line; and the old fire from the bosom of my soul sprung to life. The line zipped and I waited with a patience one can only learn after having lost many fish to an eager hook set. When I did pull the rod back, the fish was mine.

Seventeen pound test, 25 minutes of fighting produced this beauty: a 40" redfish, weighing in around 30lbs. In the moments that this fish tugged and pulled against me, a felt the joy and anticipation of deeper struggle. A fight that pits all of humankind against nature.

I know there are those who want to view humanity as a tiny red fleck of meat in a huge goldfish bowl. To these sorts of folks, I can only raise a finger to my lips and beg their silence. Humanity is special -- so special in fact that we can unleash ourselves upon her with ferocity and mavolence at a moment's notice. Just ask this fish. Ask him while he shudders and turns beneath the flexing of my wrists. Ask him while his gills absorb a poisoned tar which we've unbottled from the crust of our planet.

We don't do humanity any favors by pretending to be so small. We certainly don't do Nature any either. Perhaps one day soon, I will outline the reasons why I am a philosophical transhumanist. But for today, I am content to bask in a pre-oil glaze, casting a zealous gaze at my prize. It's life in those moments belong to me. And the life of this planet -- all life -- that belongs to us.

What we do with it appears to be another story altogether. Because as I sit typing, our hubris is collecting on the shore in sullen, dirty balls of tar.