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How fittingly ironic was it that some Connecticut Patch websites asking readers to submit their best caption to describe a playful shark about to devour a slice of pizza. Just several hours after the picture was posted, the Internet was flooded with a photograph of a real shark appearing to stalk a kayaker off Cape Cod.
The image was breathtaking and one that produced enough, "OMG's" to cause an entire wireless network to crash. A dorsal fin slicing through the ocean, a man looking back in disbelief, and a paddleboarder looking on, hoping the unthinkable wouldn't happen. The only thing missing was the dramatic music from the movie, "Jaws", to accelerate our heartbeats.
In this day and age where everyone has a digital camera and a vehicle (Facebook and Twitter) to send their pictures to anywhere in the world instantaneously, we are rarely shocked anymore by the images that come across our computers, iPhones, and iPads. This photograph was shocking. We gazed at the frame for several minutes, wondering what could possibly going through that man's mind. Life? death? Did it all seem like a blur. We even went back to it for another look, just to make sure what we saw was, indeed, real.
It was real all right, and anyone who has shared the ocean with the creatures that lurk below, is certain they could easily have been that man in the kayak who paddled away furiously to escape the wrath of that Great White Shark, which was estimated to be somewhere between 12 and 14 feet.
The photo is like a magnet, pulling us closer to see if the result is going to different and or even more ominous than it already was. The most feared predator in the sea with a radar-lock on a blue kayak, which may have well been Captain Quint's vessel, Orca in "Jaws". We wanted more pictures. We wanted a sequence of photos to slide across the page. They never came. There was just one picture and it was worth far more than 1,000 words.
If there was another contest asking for your caption to the shark chasing the kayaker photo, what creative title would you submit? "Hail Mary, full of grace...", would certainly work. "Never look back, something might be gaining on you", fits like a glove. The obligatory, "You're going to need a bigger boat," definitely applies.
By noon on Tuesday, there were more than 85 entries for caption to the shark and pizza photo. I have a feeling, we might get many more suggestions for the photo above in about half the time. Be creative, sink your teeth into it.
