I sat there on my surfboard, gasping and feeling my heart race. The water was warm and a beautiful clear light green and off in the distance I could see the other surfers riding on the small glassy waves that morning. Suddenly, I could see the headlines in the local news; Surfer found dead, laying face-down in the water, still attached to his board with the leash. People would speculate about surfing alone, above your ability, or more generally about the idea that when your time is up, your time is up. They would scour my medical records for some history of heart disease, and many more would shake their heads, saying that he died doing what he loved best, but none of them would know what really happened.
I was really happy that morning, the waves were fun, the weather was perfect and we were surrounded by dolphins. In fact, I was seeing more at one time than I would usually see in a whole day. They ignored us and were going about their day fishing and jumping for fun it seemed like. Then a really young kid with a shock of bleach-blonde hair and a longboard big enough for a large man, yelled out to me, and all I hear was "....tea!" I was thinking the kid couldn't tell the difference between a dolphin and a shark and then I looked down into the water. Right below the surface a huge head was looking straight up at me, mere inches from my board. The body was huge and dark, and before my brain had a chance to process a single thought, my heart and lungs went into panic mode. It only lasted a few seconds until the word "Manatee" processed and I put my hand out to say hello, but the look right before that must have scared the manatee off, because he left much faster than I thought a manatee could swim...
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