I‘m taking part in a 30-day writing experiment. The theme for me is “personal, not pretty.” See Kale & Cigarettes for details and the Facebook Group to read stories by other 500-words-ers.
On Sundays we do family things.
It’s a creative project unto itself to come up with new and fun things to do around here every Sunday. In the morning I googled “Fun family things to do in and around Salt Lake City,” and I was dismayed to realize I’ve already done almost all of the things. I must be more industrious than I give myself credit for.
By default, we ended up at the aquarium in nearby Draper.
For a Utah suburb with basically zero culture, Draper has a pretty smart aquarium. I mean, it was probably the worst aquarium I’ve ever been to, but honestly, that’s not a diss. I’ve only been to world-class aquariums like the ones in San Francisco, Monterey, and Baltimore. The Baltimore aquarium in particular is really wonderful. I had a somewhat spiritual experience with the jellyfish there once.
Jellyfish are my aquarium jam. I bet everyone has an aquarium jam. Jon’s jam is ducks. He is seriously crazy about ducks. I mean, I guess I can see why ducks are cool, but it’s like a calling for him. I felt like I had pretty much dragged him to the aquarium yesterday, until he saw the ducks. “Wait…. There’s ducks here?”
I love that he has a favorite bird. Aside, because this post is going nowhere and I have nothing much to say this morning: We named one of our daughters after a bird. Well, not just one bird, but a type of bird: the phoebe. Phoebes are abundant in forested Western Massachusetts, where I grew up. I have strong memories of hearing them outside our kitchen window in the green months:
Phoeeeeeee-beeee. Phoeeeeeee-beeee. Phoeeeeeee-beeee.
I guess you could say they are my favorite bird.
But my aquarium jam is still jellyfish. How can one creature be so simultaneously prehistoric and other-worldy? So literally brainless* and yet so elegant?
Once I made a video about jellyfish. I think this was from the San Francisco Academy of Sciences. It’s, ahem, worth 150 words.
(If the movie below is not loading for you, click here to watch it on YouTube.)
* I had a hunch this was true but googled it just to be sure.
