Saturday

I went fishing in Florida once, said Rebecca, and the ocean is absolutely teeming with violence. I pulled a two-foot kingfish out of the water. It fought and fought—well, for a minute I fought it—and then bam it comes up easy as an old boot, half-eaten. Between the time it snagged my hook and the minute later when I landed it a barracuda had bit it in half. The captain just laughs and throws it off the deck, and I watched it sink. And I am pissed. I did all that work. I took it personally that this other fish had come after my fish. What had become my fish. I am there in a boat ninety minutes from shore with some fiberglass between me and all this. I mean we're on land and we don't take it seriously how insane it is out there. You're at the beach throwing a ball around laughing in the sand and out beneath the waves there is this slaughterhouse, this horror movie. Shark week forever. It's amazing the ocean doesn't just run blood all the time.

I went fishing in Florida once, said Rebecca, and the ocean is absolutely teeming with violence. I pulled a two-foot kingfish out of the water. It fought and fought—well, for a minute I fought it—and then bam it comes up easy as an old boot, half-eaten. Between the time it snagged my hook and the minute later when I landed it a barracuda had bit it in half. The captain just laughs and throws it off the deck, and I watched it sink. And I am pissed. I did all that work. I took it personally that this other fish had come after my fish. What had become my fish. I am there in a boat ninety minutes from shore with some fiberglass between me and all this. I mean we're on land and we don't take it seriously how insane it is out there. You're at the beach throwing a ball around laughing in the sand and out beneath the waves there is this slaughterhouse, this horror movie. Shark week forever. It's amazing the ocean doesn't just run blood all the time.