Stuck on a Sandbar

We moved to Dauphin Island, Alabama, in 2018. We had owned property on the Island for years, but we had never taken the leap to actually make it our home. Looking back, I think we arrived exactly when we needed to.

Our home gave us stability, transformation, and peace during a season when we needed all three. There is something healing about being surrounded by water, and you wouldn’t believe how much our lives have changed since we’ve been here.

We’ve learned to love birds. Who knew birds could be so entertaining? We’ve watched more sunsets than I could ever count from our back porch. We’ve caught some of the best-tasting blue crabs you’ve ever put in your mouth right off our dock. Of course, feeding them fresh snapper scraps beforehand probably helps the flavor! We’ve weathered a few storms and enjoyed countless quiet mornings watching dolphins swim by while feeling that cool, salty breeze on our faces.

But one of the most entertaining, and oddly educational, parts of island life has been watching people get stuck on a sandbar.

The Sandbar Claims Another One

Our home sits off Bayou Heron and Little Graveline Bay, overlooking a beautiful chain of small islands just beyond our channel. The area is alive with birds, oysters, flounder, sea turtles, and all kinds of little creatures that call these shallow waters home.  There’s also a boat launch just upstream from our house, so we see boats coming and going all day long.

And then there’s THE sandbar.

If you don’t know these waters, you’d naturally assume the deeper water runs through what appears to be the middle of the channel. It doesn’t. The navigable water is actually closer to the piers and docks, while a sometimes-hidden sandbar reaches right out into the path that looks like the obvious way to go.

You can probably see where this is headed.

We’ve watched many a happy family begin their beautiful day of boating or Gulf fishing…

STUCK. On a sandbar.

I probably shouldn’t admit how entertaining this has become for us. Our regular guests even know to watch for the next innocent victim of the sandbar. 😂 We, along with most of our neighbors, try to warn approaching boaters before it happens. We’ll yell. We’ll wave. We’ll point them toward deeper water.

Some captains get the message. 

Others are completely entranced by the journey ahead and sail right on by.

And then there are the ones who ignore the NO WAKE zone and come barreling through a little faster than they should. Those are particularly entertaining because sometimes the extra speed doesn’t get them across the sandbar.  It just gets them more stuck.

Fortunately, most eventually figure a way to get unstuck. They shift some weight around, push themselves off, wade while pulling or pushing, reverse course, or somehow work their way back toward deeper water.  And off they go. 

Until the next boat comes along.  And here we go again.  And this doesn’t just happen occasionally.  It is multiple times a day. Every day. 

Aren’t We All Doing the Same Thing?

After watching this happen enough times, I started thinking about how much life resembles that channel.

We’re all navigating waters we’ve never traveled before.

Sometimes we’re moving slowly and cautiously. Sometimes we’re moving way too fast. And quite often, we’re cruising along on autopilot, completely unaware of the sandbar sitting just beneath the surface ahead of us.  Anyone remember, the Titanic?? 

The funny thing is, there are often people standing on the shoreline trying to warn us.

Parents. Friends. Mentors. People who’ve made the same mistake. People who’ve already traveled these waters and know where the shallow spots are.

Sometimes even God.

But we’re busy.  We are distracted. We’ve got a destination.  We’ve got a plan.

And from where we’re sitting, the water ahead looks perfectly fine.

So, we keep going.  Full speed ahead.

And then sometimes, we get stuck.  We hit a sandbar.

Worse yet, sometimes we do exactly what those speeding boaters do: when we feel resistance, we give it more gas.  We think pushing harder is the solution.

We work harder. Push harder. Spend more. Try to force the relationship. Force the opportunity. Force the timing. Force the plan.