Another Ball Rolling Down Hurricane Alley

Tropical Storm Rita has cleared out the Florida Keys like a drag queen at a Promise Keepers Convention.

So another swirly-looking ball is headed toward the Keys, and I'm on pins and needles, hoping the Keys aren't destroyed like New Orleans was.

That string of little islands is part of my native memory, home to my earliest recollection. My Dad's parents managed a hotel in Key West for years, and when I was but a tot, my Mom's parents used to spend every spare moment fishing off the Upper Keys and staying at their favorite establishment.

My brother and sister and I have returned there as adults and made our own memories. My brother and I each tend to visit the part where we spent the most time as kids: he goes to Key West, I visit Islamorada and Marathon and devote only a day or so to Key West. My sister, TS and I celebrated my thirtieth birthday swimming with the dolphins at the Dolphin Research Center on Grassy Key. One of my most breathtaking memories is diving with TS at the John Pennekamp State Park, and watching mesmerized as an enormous sea turtle swam between us, breaking our linked hands.

Just last week my brother and I were having a discussion about what our ideal day would look like. Here's what I said:

Trailhead: Here's my ideal day: Sleep till I wake up, which is early, because the windows are open and I can hear the palm fronds rustling in the breeze, along with the waves lapping up on the pier and the occasional seagull squawking. Throw on a bathing suit and some shorts and flip flops. Shoot the sunrise off the pier. Head to the Blue Mountain and drink coffee while sitting in the Adirondacks under the palm trees, and petting the stray kitties. Talk to some local about how he used to be rich but after he lost it all he came down here. Then go to the Marker 88 pier and photograph the heron there for half an hour or so. Throw the kayaks onto the rental car and put in at Whale Harbor. Make the open water crossing to the mangroves, wondering whether there are sharks underneath. Cruise around the mangroves. Get in the water and shoot the Nikonos when it's clear enough. Head back to condo. Gather dive gear for an afternoon reef dive. The water is smooth as glass. Do the scissor step off the boat and enter the food chain. Shoot the Nikonos at a couple of clown fish and a lobster. Run hand over the giant sea turtle's barnacle-crusted back as he swims by. See a reef shark. Get off the boat and go to dinner at Islamorada Fish Market or Marker 88. Have a mango salad, a bowl of conch chowder, scores of grilled shrimp, and key lime pie. Watch the sunset since I had the good sense to go to dinner on the gulf side. Drift off to sleep to the palm fronds that are still rustling in the breeze.

Trailhead Brother: That sounds pretty good. Grilled shrimp. Your day seems very National Geographic.

Trailhead: You're right, it is very National Geographic. Except I forgot drinks at the tiki bar in Marathon after dinner.

This is the sort of trip I hunger to take in March, when I have gone so loopy from lack of sun that I can no longer be trusted not to burst through a door with an ax and a manic grin and announce, "Here's Trailhead!"

So I get a little nervous when I see one of those little twisties headed toward my islands. We've seen the devastating loss of culture, tradition and history in New Orleans. To think of Mallory Square and Duval Street destroyed, or the Marker 88 or the Rain Barrel blown to bits -- that's too much for my intestinal fortitude.

Some small part of me just needs to know those places are still there. Thing is, they won't always be. And as we have seen so graphically of late, they could be gone sooner rather than later.