My Current Favorites [May June 2021] Missed Connections by Sophie Blackall
Seeing a “Missed Connection” pop up on my Instagram today reminded me of this beautiful book by Sophie Blackall that I’ve read and reread dozens of times.
Sophie Blackall is a children’s book illustrator. One day, after an encounter with a charming stranger who told her to find him on “missed connections,” she discovered the concept and decided to illustrate one “missed connection” a week on her blog. The blog gained traction and a book was published (Amazon link)
A “missed connection” is an encounter between two strangers – or two people who knew each other – but for some mysterious reason, or out of shyness, neither of them dared to make the first move / reach out and they regret it because they don’t know what might have happened if they had. But life can give everyone a second chance, so on Craigslist, the free classifieds site, there’s a section where people can post their “missed connection” ad for free to find the person in question – like sending a message in a bottle.
The story that struck me and haunted me the most in this book is this one. The book is in English, but I wanted to translate this excerpt for you. Get your tissues ready!
The worst part is that it’s a true story, and we’ll never, ever know what happened next…
Note: M4M stands for “men for men”: a message in a bottle from one man to another
The Whale at Coney Island
– M4M — 69
(Brooklyn/Florida)
A young friend of mine recently introduced me to the intricacies of Missed Connections, and I decided to try to find you one last time.
Many years ago, we were both friends and teachers in New York. Perhaps we could have been lovers too, but we weren’t. We used to go to Coney Island, especially in the spring, when we would walk hand in hand – until our palms got too sweaty – along the boardwalk and take refuge in the cool darkness of the aquarium. We loved visiting the whale. One spring, she arrived, pregnant, from her winter home (Florida? I don’t remember). Everyone at the aquarium was very excited: a baby beluga was going to be born in New York! You insisted that we not miss the birth, so every day after classes, and on Saturdays and Sundays, we took the D train from Harlem to Coney Island.
We arrived one Saturday at the aquarium’s opening, and there was a sign hanging on the tank. The baby beluga was stillborn. The mother, the sign said, was recovering but would be fine. We read the sign in shock and watched the whale in her tank. She was circling slowly. Neither of us could speak.
Suddenly, without warning, the whale started throwing herself against the walls of the tank. The trainers came and escorted us out. We sat on a bench outside, and suddenly I felt tears streaming down my face. You saw, turned my face toward yours, and kissed me. We had never kissed before, and I let my lips linger on yours for a second before I got up and headed toward the ocean.
It was too much – the whale, the death of the baby whale, the kiss – and I wasn’t ready.
Forgive me – I don’t think I ever understood what a void you left when you went away, and I realized that our kiss on Coney Island was the first and the last.
Are you out there, dear friend?
If so, please reply. I think of you, and I have often thought of you, all these years.
I did some research on my end, and the baby beluga was stillborn in July 1972. Right after the birth, the baby was in a panic and hit its head against the tank. Hence the strange behavior of the mother whale. Two years later, the mother whale named Francis was pregnant again, but she also lost her second baby, and it affected her health. She died in 1974.
So the man must have posted his missed connection in 2019, 37 years after the fact. Based on his message, he tried to find his friend several times, and his missed connection must be the last attempt.
