Tiger of the Sea

This is a barracuda. It is known as the tiger of the sea... because it is such a fierce predator. The other day when we were snorkeling at Pigeon Keys Paul, Sus, and I saw a large one... probably about 3 feet long. The scary thing about barracudas is they can be seemingly gliding along minding their own business one minute and the next they are 20 feet away sawing their prey into bits. I'm not joking. So when we swam into this friendly fish's neighborhood we quickly swam away... and it followed us! Sus's comment "WE'RE GONNA DIE!" was not comforting :). But as you can assume, we survived.

THEN... on Saturday, Joe, Deirdre and I went snorkeling at Ross Key. We saw what Joe said is one of the biggest schools of fish he's seen in this part of the ocean and decided to swim through it. It was amazing! There were so many fish I couldn't see straight and I didn't know which way I was swimming. Think Finding Nemo times 100. There were all kinds of fish swimming along with the school of tiny silver fish. Parrot fish, blue tangs, weird pointy ones, HUGE groupers (Joe called them tiger groupers), and all kinds of other fish. So I think I'm having one of the best experiences ever when Joe pops his head up and says "We need to get out of here, there's a big barracuda" (for Joe to say big barracuda it would be HUGE in my vocab). Well wouldn't you know it? The HUGE barracuda was directly under me! So I flail and scramble and flop around completely ungracefully to sneak away from the fish that wants to EAT me... and ended up separated from Joe and Deirdre! And... as I looked back down... the barracuda was chopping its ginormous mouth at me and charging in my direction! And those of you that know me KNOW I freaked out. I lost it. Try hyperventilating through a snorkel :) Not good.

Well I made my way back to Joe and kept him between me and the barracudas the rest of the time. And actually, as we kept our distance from the scary fish and swam along side the breathtaking school of fish... it was such a gorgeous part of creation I didn't want to leave! I realized that although barracudas are scary and want to eat me, as long as I heed their warnings and swim away (SLOWLY) I'll probably be okay. It was amazing to see how God created the ocean so uniquely and wonderfully. How so many thousands and thousands of fish can swim together in the same direction and not seem to communicate with one another... how He creatively made each species... how could this be here arbitrarily?! Now... barracudas might be a mistake... but I'm not one to judge.