2003-08-24 12:28 a.m.
Witches, Whales, and Wenches

Well, we made it home. Alive. Exhausted, but still breathing. Can I just say how much driving in the state of Massachusetts sucks? There is no other way of saying it; it just sucks. Six-way intersections colliding with a single traffic light sitting on a giant tire in the center of it all. No stop signs where there should definitely be some. Oh, the confusion. Nobody knows how to drive there. I know, I know, you're thinking, "Man, this chick's from New York and she's saying people from Massachusetts can't drive!?!" But they can't. This is one situation (probably the only one) where it wasn't just me.

Ok, so we made it into MA just fine. Our directions to Salem, however, were wrong. Not that there was construction, or the directions were just a little bit off. They were dead fucking wrong. So a five-hour trip became an eight hour one, with me driving the entire way, completely losing my temper with a fellow motorist("Fuck you, cocksucker! Motherfucker, I'll kill you!" Yes, that bad.), and then later, sometime around our eighth hour in the car, I lost it completely. Ever have one of those instances when you're both crying and laughing hysterically at the same time? I must have looked like a maniac. A complete lunatic. But after we finally made it to the heart of Salem and found somewhere to stay (the Clipper Ship Inn; nice, cheap place), I relaxed a bit and we eventually began to have a good time. Which is what vacation's all about, right? Having a good time? We caught the last show at the Witch museum (I love their Satan; I bought a postcard with a picture of him on it...if they should ever go out of business Steve and I agreed that we would buy the Satan and hang him in our living room), then we mucked about town a bit while I took photos of all the wicked looking things there: the statue of Roger Conant, who founded the village of Salem, the statue of Nathaniel Hawthorne (I'm not explaining who that is; if you don't know, go fucking look it up), a neato looking wrought-iron fence, a huge sailing vessel in the harbor, and whatever else tickled my fancy. Bought a Salem, MA t-shirt with a pirate skull on it that's got a gold tooth, a Salem Witch Museum mug ("Stop by for a Spell"), and one of those souvenir pens that I rarely see anymore; with a tiny something in the top part of it that glides up and down. Ours has got a witch on her broom sailing between the statue of Roger Conant and a tree. Pretty neat.

Next day we hit Boston, which is regular city driving and nothing to get all worked up over. This time, we only got lost for about half an hour before reaching our destination: the New England Aquarium. Best damn aquarium on the Eastern Seaboard. We popped up there for a weekend two summers ago and have been dying to go back ever since. It's a magic place for us. When we were there two years ago, we'd just gotten together a few months before, so we split our time between making out in dark corners and being utterly fascinated by the sea creatures we encountered. They have a Giant Pacific Octopus that we just fell in love with. They have gargantuan lobsters and stingrays (our favorite) that are simply awe-inspiring. They have three different species of penguins (African, Rockhopper, and Little Blue)and these massive, friendly-looking fish called Pacu that look as though they are grinning unabashedly all the time. But the best part is the huge tank in the middle of the building. It's a circular tank; visitors walk up a spiral ramp around the perimeter of it and it houses an entire pacific coral reef, resplendent with fish and ocean creatures of all shapes and sizes, some of them as small as my thumb, some of them bigger than my kitchen table. The shark was missing this time, though; I wonder if they set him free. There's a Sea Turtle (not sure what species; either a Kemp's Ridley or a Green Sea Turtle) in there that's as big as an easy chair and I was immediately gripped by a child's fantasy to sit cross-legged on his back while we traveled clear across the Atlantic to land upon distant shores.

The rest of that day was spent whale watching, which is something I would do every weekend if I lived in a place where that would be feasible. I love being out on a boat where there is nothing but ocean as far as the eye can see. I can't believe that some people are distressed by this! Someday, I will learn to sail and live on a boat with nobody but Steve, our two cats, and our two fish. Anyway, the whales. We saw four Humpbacks and about ten different Minke whales. At one point, the boat was entirely surrounded by whales. Some of the Minkes swam quite close to the boat, which is supposedly really rare, as they are some of the shyest of the whale species. Two of the Humpbacks, a mother and calf, stayed with us the entire time. The baby caused a ruckus by spinning himself horizontally in the water, which made his flippers come up like he was waving at us. And then...and then...we got to see them breach! Imagine seeing these immense, majestic creatures come fully out of the water from tip to tail and then come back down with a titanic splash. It was one of the most beautiful things I have ever witnessed; I will never forget the sight of it, the sound of it when they landed. I always get the feeling, whenever we whale watch, that these grand, awesome creatures are showing off for us. They know we are there for the express purpose of seeing them. They know.

So then we trekked back home and it felt really good to lock ourselves in our messy apartment with the clothes all over the floor and the dirty dishes in the sink and the books strewn about and the litterbox that's needed changing for some time now. It's home. Tomorrow we go a-wenching at the Renaissance Faire. Our plan is to catch one, you see, so we have someone to do the cleaning and the cooking and the laundry while we sit idly by with our noses planted deeply in our books, or play Dark Alliance and eat pizza and chain smoke, or lock ourselves in the bedroom and make whale noises all night to entertain the neighbors.

Current Read: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon

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