Return to The Loop | A Land Story

RETURN TO THE LOOP

A Land Story by Debi Canterbury

    Maggie’s chocolate curls bounced with each jolt of the Ford Aerostar minivan. Riding in the trunk, seat-beltless, we could only see the canopy of live oaks. They stretched over the road like a fort built by nature herself. We felt alive with criminal activity as we rounded the curves of the salt marsh heading to the beach. 

    The rest of the minivan held her parents, sisters, and relatives visiting from the Midwest. I tagged along, like an entitled adopted sister. 

    Though this was our usual route, the relatives were excited to take what they called “The Ormond Loop” because of its notoriety as a habitat for exotic birds. I’d never heard of bird watching, but it sounded stuffy and boring as hell. Why would an Indiana judge travel all the way down to Florida to watch some normal old birds? They spoke of Great Blue Herons, Snowy Egrets, and Roseate Spoonbills with the reverence I’d only heard reserved for the Bible. Though, I also thought the cheerleader cousin was making dull vacation choices as she tanned outside on a lounge chair. 

    The magic of my homeland felt normal. Didn’t every kid get reprimanded by their neighbor for trudging through a water-moccasin-infested ditch? Maggie and I sought adventure, and when we couldn’t find it, we created it. Pool water turned our girlhood legs into mermaid tails and backyard hammocks transformed into covered back wagons pulling us off into the great unknown. We only needed to step into our backyard for wilderness exploits. We blazed trails and dug a hole for dinosaur bones so deep our operation was shut down by the adults.

    Our neighborhood backed onto a state park whose boundaries sprawled across the salt marsh that bordered the Tomoka River. That dense hardwood hammock appears spooky to some, but our girlhood hearts knew it as home. 

    We lived wild and we lived free in those woods, among the coral snake that snuck into our pool and the alligator my older brother lassoed.

    We traversed The Loop for library days where our librarian, dressed in a neck-tie silk blouse, read aloud through her thick lenses about an old woman who swallowed a fly. I rode The Loop with Maggie’s mother to pick her up from Catholic school, awaiting the taste of the Ding Dong snacks she’d packed for us. Then, we’d spook ourselves with ominous nursery rhyme chants through the tunnel of trees leading us home. 

    One day, Maggie left me for the cornfields of Indiana. We were fifth graders, nearing the end of our carefree childhood. Three years later, my family would move as well. The Loop vanished from my life, and with it, the adventures. My interests in pirating and tide pools transitioned into shopping and boys. I’d become boring. 

    

    That spark of adventure did return, and after college, I needed to explore. So, I flew over the Pacific Ocean, living and teaching in what felt like a different world. I walked The Great Wall of China, parasailed in Hainan Dao. Then I fell in love with a Canadian, braving Ontario winters. 

    Twenty years later, I returned to The Loop. Our home now borders the same hardwood hammock, canopy of trees, and sprawling salt marsh. Now my own children drive it with me - to school, the library, the beach. The Loop embraces this new generation as they adventure on her wild and wonderful landscape. 

Maggie & Me - I still claim to be her entitled adopted sister.