hairoun, "home of the blessed"

although they all look the same, lately i've been purchasing a lot of postcards. it's one more attempt to recall where i've landed. most recently heading up the assembly, i've added bequia, mustique, the tobago cays, canouan, palm island, and union island. jumbled together, these make up some of the focal destinations in the grenadine island chain. separate, their mention will forever evoke jaw-dropping flashbacks of a truly wondrous place and experience. the front runner of the group being the tobago cays. they are a small group of deserted islands that time seems to have forgotten. relatively unaffected by disruptions of man, or disasters by nature, these islands are protected by a horseshoe reef. navigating a boat amidst the reef is daring, but possible. needless to say, the snorkeling is phenomenal. the water dances in a kaleidoscope of colors, changing from blue to turquoise to green. below the surface the reef emits a mirror of colored fire, bouncing from gold to brown. in a box of 64, crayola doesn't exist inside the realm of color schemes i saw. i nominate 'tobago turquoise' for review. it would be a most exquisite crayon of aquamarine consistency, glittering with sun-kissed emerald flakes, and a shallow violet core. every kid would want one. every kid should see this. balanced by a confectioners' sugar white sandy bottom, the reef is littered with booming coral heads and a thrilling amount of diversity amongst the biomass. the marine life here has perfect attendance. i float past a slow-swimming nurse shark. he seems to be as enamored with the ocean as i am. almost lackadaisically, he woos me with his grace and agility. from head to tail we were equal in length. in this water, i was his equal. i maybe spent and hour swimming with this shark, imitating his nimbleness and keeping with the rhythm. it was as if he would perform the sequence of a dance and turn to me in gesture to say, "okay, now you try." i would do my best and engage my most shark-like moves, after which he would applaud. following a shark-guided tour of the reef, i was ready to trade in my twin-jet fins for a dorsal fin, and my snorkel for a set of gills. at least i know in some other life, i most certainly had a tail! tonight i'll dream of re-growing it...