Diving for cover

Took my car in for a service this week. Rather than walk home and then back again to pick up the car I thought I’d do a few hours sea watching. It wasn’t raining … ideal.

After an hour of the three hours I spent staring through a telescope at the North Sea I was conscious of a presence near to me. I looked sideways and there was a lady standing but a matter of inches from me.

“Would you mind please STEPPING BACK” said I. It took her a little by surprise. Why I don’t know but there does seem to be a wilful disregard for simple rules designed to keep us all safe. However, my volume had the desired effect and she stepped back.

I returned my eye to the scope … but after a silence I sensed she was brewing a comment.

“Can’t you find something more useful to do?” was the retort.

Now, if you know me you will know that for the most part I am a mild mannered man. However, I have been subject to so many people doing as they wish for so long this year quite frankly it is beginning to get on my tits. She and people like her are keeping me from seeing and hugging my daughter. I must admit at this point I saw red and she was the recipient of a polite but assertive dialogue.

“I am watching the sea to monitor marine mammals. The information I , and others like me, gather enables decisions to be taken by authorities and decision makers to protect both the environment and our native marine fauna for me, for you, your children and your children’s children for years to come. So, the next time you see me spending my spare time looking out to sea you may thank me, from a distance, and MOVE ON”

I didn’t make a friend that day but perhaps her silence thereafter indicates it will make her think a little about what matters if not to her, to others.

Had she been more respectful I may have shown her the Red throated Diver in the surf to which she was completely oblivious. Just one of three species of diver seen that morning.