Aquarium

I used to go to the Long Beach Aquarium so I could get out of the car and stand shoulder to shoulder with strangers and look at something together. I would stop at the Surge Channel exhibit, an aquarium emulating the North Pacific Ocean. It has mechanically generated waves, the water goes up and down, and the fish in it back and forth. There are rockfish from Alaska, surfperch from Siberia, and kelp greenlings from Japan, all contained tightly together, agitated rhythmically in the fake current. I would stand with others and imagine the cold waters of the sea. I'd lose myself in the light; it reminded me of my fights back home. After the long night, somewhere above the Mediterranean, the sun would penetrate through the tinted windows and flood the plane in a deep blue.