Message in a Bottle

       A few days ago one of my friends posted something about a little boy from Ireland who found a message in a bottle. That brought back a memory, something that I forgot about from years ago. I once sent a message in a bottle, when I was vacationing on Cape Cod, in Massachusetts. I was probably about 8 years old. Our family used to rent a sandy, little beach place in East Brewster with my aunt and uncle. It was the highlight of our year, as we were allowed to do whatever we wanted, could get as dirty as possible, swim all day, build sandcastles, and dig for clams. One day my father suggested I write a message, put it in a bottle, and throw it into the ocean, and perhaps someone from a faraway land would find it.
       When we children were little, "go send a message in a bottle" or "go skip rocks" or "go build a sandcastle" were all code words my parents used that really meant, "get out of our hair because we're on vacation, too, and perhaps we might want to have sex in the afternoon." It didn't matter, though, we complied. Because I didn't have a piece of paper, I used a paper plate and with a ball point pen, I wrote a short letter that stated who I was, my age and where I lived, and that if someone finds my message in a bottle, perhaps we could become pen pals. Then I rolled up the plate, shoved it in a used wine bottle, stuck a cork in it, and tossed it into the bay at high tide.
       Then I forgot about it. Until one day, several months later, when I was back in Granby, CT, where we lived, I received a letter in the mail. Can you imagine my surprise when I opened the envelope and there was my rolled up paper plate and a short note from a man and woman who found my message in a bottle. They lived across the bay on Cape Cod, although I don't recall the town, and found the bottle while walking on the beach one morning. So what happened was, the tide carried the bottle a few miles away from where I threw it. And you'd think I'd be delighted, but I wasn't.
       Instead, I was irritated that my message in a bottle took a short journey, not a long one, and I was also a little ashamed of my geographical stupidity - I mean, seriously, where else would the bottle go, except across the bay? If I had any sense I would have gone to the other side of Cape Cod and tossed it into the ocean. Then maybe the tide would have carried it to Ireland, or Portugal, or at least Nova Scotia.
       But the reality of the story is that I sent a message in a bottle one day, and someone found it and sent me a letter back. How often does something like that happen, anyway? With all the flotsam and jetsam bobbing about in the oceans these days, who would even care to look inside a bottle? And the fact that the bottle made it to shore without breaking on a rock is a miracle itself, even if it just traveled to the other side of the bay.
       I didn't appreciate that miracle back then. But I do today. And perhaps I will send another message out and see what happens. But maybe not in a bottle. That would be littering.