The Lighthouse Keeper
BY DANIEL W. DRAKE ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER

Ididn’t notice anything unusual as we approached the beach at North Cambridge Street on Saturday, taking advantage of one of the last days before the beginning of the shotgun season to take our usual exercise-thedog/ exercise-the-owners walk, and to work off some of the remaining vestiges of Thanksgiving dinner. To my surprise, my wife reached down and picked up a live scallop from the sand in the road perhaps seventy yards before the beach.

In one of the largest scallop shells I have ever seen, the animal opened and closed a couple of times, indicating it was still very much with us. We immediately decided to throw it back in the water, since one scallop does not a meal make!

How did it get there, in the sand on the road? Scallops are in such short supply this year that it seems unlikely that anyone would have enough that it would have spilled out over the side of a brimming basket. Scallops are notorious among shellfish for their mobility – but only in the water. Did a sea gull lift it up in the air and drop it, only to fail in the attempt to have the impact break the shell because of the old guy’s toughness? We might never know.

In covering the short distance to the water, I thought I would take advantage of the situation and ask the scallop about my friend, Simone La Pomme de Mer, who might be deemed missing in action, since I haven’t seen her in several months.

“Can you speak? I said.

After a lengthy silence, the scallop sputtered “Whadya you want?”

“Well, I would like to know if you have a name and how you came to be so far from the water?”

There was another long pause. Finally the scallop let go with stream of sand directed at me and sputtered, “How would I know how got up here? It stinks. It’s noisy and dusty and dangerous. Give me the water any time. And get off it; scallops don’t have names!

“Now don’t get upset,” I said. “I was just asking. In fact, I know of a scallop who does have a name, Simone la Pomme de Mer. Do you know her?”

“Oh yea, that nut!” the scallop laughed. “I know who she was. She thought she knew everything about everything. She used to make a big deal about how she would talk to some guy, and he would take her seriously and write about the things she said. The rest of us used to think she was nuts. But I don’t think even she knew she had a name. Names are a human thing.”

“Wait a second,” I interrupted. “You said she ‘was’ and ‘used to.’ Does that mean she’s dead?”

“Of course she’s dead,” the scallop retorted. It stared at me with those beautiful blue eyes. “You aren’t going to cry on me are you? She lived a good long time. One way or the other she was going to get it; from a seagull or a person or crab, or just plain old age. Her time was up, just like mine is.”

I had known that, but the thought that my muse would no longer be sharing her views on the local scene with me was still a shock. I decided I didn’t want to know how she died. I also knew that her demise would come as a great relief to some people.

I fell into silence as I mentally composed a sort of obituary. I knew she would have wanted something pithy because that was her nature.

Simone la Pomme de Mer, 2003-2005. An individualist of great character, with unusual perception and an uncanny ability to get right to the heart of things.

I finally roused my self from my reverie and said to the scallop in hand, “Do you really think she was crazy?”

“Well,” he replied, “I did kind of think that. I mean, look, I have to be crazy talking to you like this and you have to be even crazier listening to me. But, I have to say, that Simone wasn’t all bad. In fact, I kind of liked her. She was a real pain some times because she always told you what she thought. But she knew her stuff as well as anyone.

“I would hear her go on and on about some of the things that were happening on land – I don’t know how she knew, but she did and I would say to myself, no group of beings can be so foolish.

“I didn’t understand half the stuff she was saying, but I knew enough to realize that life is pretty straight forward underwater. I guess she couldn’t find much in our simple world to get fired up about, so she made it her business to tell you all how to run your lives.

“Wait a minute! Are you the guy she used to talk to all the time?”

I thought for a minute before replying. “I bear most of the responsibility for that. When we first met, I was so impressed with her insights that I would go back to find her, to get a grounding when I was kind of at a loss on how to speak to an issue. She was great in helping me frame my approach. And there was always a bit of an edge to what she said. I like that. I will miss her.”

“You going to write about this?” the scallop suddenly asked.

“I might. Why?”

“I never should have opened my shell. I should have played dead. Now I’ll be the laughing stock of the entire harbor. Get me back in the water, or whatever you are going to do with me! Leave me alone.”

I apologized for any offense I might have caused and reminded the scallop that I had no way of identifying him in print, but nothing more was forthcoming. The shell remained tightly closed, although, as the scallop’s path arced on its way back into the water, I thought I heard some expletive escape.

On the way home, I thought about Simone and how much she had helped me. Despite my uncertainty about what I will do without the benefit of her wisdom, it was a peaceful walk A red-tailed hawk watched alertly from the top of a dead pine tree as we turned the corner into our driveway and, curiously, did not take off on our approach.

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The “Lighthouse Keeper” reflects the views of the author and does not necessarily represent the editorial position of The Nantucket Independent. Please send any comments to drake@nantucketindependent. com.

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