This national recognition day began in Hawaii to celebrate humpback whales.

I have been whale-watching three times in my life. I have never seen much more than a tail. Don’t get me wrong, that was impressive enough, but all those social media videos of full breaches or the whales swimming alongside the boat? Yeah, that won’t happen if I’m on your cruise. It might not even happen if we are at Sea World at the same time. (Do people still go to Sea World or has that outfit been canceled into nonexistence?)

The first time I went, it was on a boat out of Long Beach. I went with my friend Sharidan and was ridiculously queasy the whole time, but had a lot of fun anyway. That was due in large part to our docent, a delightful self-described old broad named Marjie who was a good friend for a few years when I lived in California. She was retired and intent on spending as much as she could of her children’s inheritance. She loved all kinds of rocks, and she had amazing collections of both geodes and jewelry. She invited me to a blowout birthday celebration—her 60^th, maybe? Or 65^th?—and she told me, “I’ve spent my life being good. I was a good daughter, a good wife, and I raised my kids right. So what’s left? I love my grandkids, but now I think I want to do all those things people kept saying I wasn’t supposed to.” Then she asked me if I could get her some cocaine or heroin. (She stayed my friend when I told her I could not.) We fell out of touch when I moved to Florida. I wonder if she’s still alive.

The second time I went was on a family vacation to Hawaii when the kid was 6 or so. I think the kid was OK with not seeing much whale action because he was allowed to steer the boat for a few glorious minutes. He had so many happy moments doing things like that, I am occasionally surprised he is not a tour captain somewhere. Of course, the day ain’t over—he might do that yet.

The third time we went was in Alaska, the summer after we went to Hawaii. That was a fun cruise because whales were, like, third on the list of what to expect, and the guaranteed attractions—glaciers and puffins— were super hard to miss. We also got to see a bunch of otters frolicking, which might actually have been more fun than whales anyway.

That doesn’t mean I don’t want to see a whale someday, though. It’ll be hard to do living in a landlocked state—I suppose I’ll just have stock up on Dramamine and get back out west someday.