What’s that Light?
Our local Rotary Club held our inaugural “Rotary Glamping Weekend” recently at Jetty Park in Port Canaveral. On an absolutely gorgeous Friday evening, several families walked along the beach, children running in and out of the shallow surf and chasing ghost crabs, all lit by a nearly full moon and highlighted by a backdrop of millions of stars.
Having walked south a bit, we eventually turned around and began the trek north toward the jetty and the campground, with all of the children carrying on their antics and doing what children all over the world do, and the older folks just taking it all in. (It’s GREAT to be a grandparent, but that’s another story).
As we approached the jetty and began the walk west over the walkway across the dunes, one curious youngster asked about “the lights” and pointed toward the horizon to the north. We identified several lights at the Air Force Station, including lightning protection towers, etc., but the youngster’s curiosity obviously had not been satisfied. “No”, he said, “the one that flashes kind of slow and is real far away”. When we realized that he had fixed on the Cape Canaveral Lighthouse rotating beacon, I was at a loss for words. How many men, women and children have witnessed that light over the past 150 years? How many circumstances and how varied those circumstances must have been. Homecoming. Relief. Fear. Reckoning. Beginning. Conclusion. Romance. The list must be endless, but on that Friday evening, an elementary school boy reminded me of why so many of us value that light so much, and why we work so hard to preserve it and share its story with others.
His journey is just starting, while mine is more than half complete, but on that Friday evening, the lighthouse brought meaning to both of us.
See you at the Lighthouse!
Rocky
