Just as the crew and I are regulars at the beach, there are other regulars in other spots and near us. It’s always interesting to see what everyone is up to since there are some different sorts of people at the beach. There is a group of about 10 rastas who are there every single day. They rent chairs, sell crafts and a variety of controlled substances. They can be friendly or surly depending on their degree of sobriety. But for the most part, since we all know each other now, they say hello but leave us alone. On good days sometimes we’ll get free mangos or coconuts. Then there is cocaine lady and her friend. I don’t know exactly what their story is, but they feel the need to dope up a couple times a day when they’re at the beach. They commune with the rastas… wink, wink. Two of our more friendly regulars are Efram and Columbus. Efram is a farmer, artist and vendor at the beach. He brings us mangos and other things from his farm. His land is all up in Babonneau, where we lived during training, and by coincidence, he’s related to Deb’s friend Gagamel. Columbus is also an artist and vendor. He also runs a water taxi between several points up north. I like both Efram and Columbus because they never ask about my husband or other questions in that vein. Both are kind of sentinels for us. When I pass Columbus, he’ll tell me if the other girls are at the beach yet.

In the past couple months, there has been a new guy who is a regular at the beach. I first noticed him about two months ago. I noticed because he always seemed to be staring into the general direction of the girls and me. One day when I was the first one at the beach, I was in swimming. When I looked back at my towel and my stuff, I saw that this guy had sat very near my spot. A little too near, in my opinion, considering the entire beach was empty. I was a little annoyed and ended up sitting in the water, all cold and prune-y, for almost an hour trying to devise a polite way to move away from the guy. I didn’t want to sit by him, but I didn’t want to be rude to a seemingly benign lonely middle age type. Finally I just made a run for it and that was fine.

But this weekend he showed his true creepy colors. There were about seven of us there together, all girls. We did our usual thing; swimming, sunning and catching up on news. Domitille had been away for several weeks, so we had a lot to catch up with her on, not the least of which is her pregnancy. We took turns exclaiming that she is starting to show, and she demonstrated for us how her belly is lopsided when she lays on her back. Then we were on to other things. Sam, Shan and Domitille each had new phones, so we all had our phones out and were entering each other’s numbers. That was pretty much that for the afternoon.

Later, however, we were all together and Domitille’s phone rang. She was away from the crowd to talk so it would be quieter. I noticed at one point she had an alarmed look on her face. When she got off the phone, she told us that it had been none other than this creepy beach guy. He had eavesdropped and taken down Domitille’s number. He called to make friends and ask her out for a drink. Apparently he caught the number, but magically seemed to miss the LENGTHY discussion of her baby and lopsided belly! What a freak show!

Shan decided then we needed to set the guy straight. She tried to call him back on Domitille’s phone, but he was unavailable. She decided there would be a showdown at the beach.

Aside: there is a Lucian precedent for beach showdowns. When a girl finds out her boyfriend is cheating, she will get together with the other girl to coordinate a confrontation at the beach. They invite all their friends and make a real scene. Lauren was invited to one such showdown in Laborie.

So Sunday I got to the beach and saw that Mr. Creepy had sat about 10 feet (ie: TOO CLOSE) to Deb’s stuff. We made a big parade of picking up our things and moving, kicking sand in his direction on the way. He didn’t seem to get it, because he stared at us. After some scheming, Shan made her move with Sam shotgun. They cornered the guy and asked him why he called Domitille. He said he was just trying to make some friends. Shan informed him that he was a creep and did not yet have down the technique for making friends, and he was never to talk to Domitille or the rest of us again. He apologized to her and fled. Hopefully he’ll find a new spot on the beach from now on.

This morning I was walking to work a little vexed. The bus driver ripped me off by $.75 and I was already annoyed from something else. There are two little hangout spots for the rastas on my road to work. There were a number of people about when I was walking up the road. I could see several guys at the first spot, but didn’t think much of it. One guy kept shouting something, though, and the passersby were all answering him. As I got closer, I saw that he was standing next to a tree with a makeshift noose around his neck. I don’t know what his story was exactly. No one seemed too alarmed. The noose was too long anyways. I was walking near another guy, and when we passed the noose guy says, "Should I do it, man??" The guy by me said, "The rope is too short". I kind of snickered but went along my way. But after I had passed the noose guy he shouted, "White lady! Should I do it?" I was still a little vexed so I told him "sure". This seemed to cause a ruckus among the guys, but I was already on my way.

When I passed back in the afternoon, things had apparently improved. The guys were all hanging out, smoking and listening to Celine Dion blaring through the neighborhood. I had to laugh; at home you would never see a group of hard-ass guys hanging out and listening to Celine Dion.