I’m always holding on. Day after day, I don’t go anywhere. I have everything I need right here.

I blend in
pretty well, and as long as I’m good and patient, a meal will always come when I need it.

So I keep holding on for my dear life. The currents are so big and strong, they wouldn’t be nice to me at
all. I see other fish swim by all the time, but they don’t usually see me. I fit in pretty well with the kelp
we call home, and the kelp is good to me.

My family has always lived here, in the kelp, ever since my parents can remember. The fast-moving
waters are kind to me as long as I keep holding on. They bring the small little crabs and shrimp so that
our family always has something to eat.

The ocean hasn’t always been good to our family. Before there were always a few of my brothers and
sisters whose tails weren’t strong and they let go. But there are so many of us it’s okay. My mom and
dad tell me that I’ve got one of the longest and strongest and curliest tails out of all of us. I’m good at
holding on. Sometimes there are other fish that get tired, so they rest in my family’s cozy patch of kelp.
But I never get tired, and my tail always holds on. I never have to take breaks and have someone else
hold on to me. I’ve never been swept away and lost like some of my brothers and sisters who weren’t
lucky enough to have a tail like mine.

I know some other fish. Sometimes the ones that take breaks in our kelp are nice to me. There are big
ones that eat some of our kelp, and some little ones that run from the big ones that don’t eat kelp.
Some of them tell me that my tail is big and strong too, although not as enthusiastically as my mom and
dad do. But most of them tell me about the bigness of the ocean outside of our kelp. They say that it
goes on almost forever every way they turn, full of even more and bigger and stronger fish. That there
are lots of other kelp patches, forests even, where they talk to the other sea horses. And every once in a
while, there are fish who are really nice to me and offer to let me hold on to their fin, so that I can see
the big ocean too. But I never go with them – I have everything I need here. I keep holding on right
where I am.

I get along with my brothers and sisters. Lots of them admire my tail, and ask me how I got my tail to be
so big and strong. Some of them are jealous of my tail, and I don’t get along with them. But I don’t mind.
I don’t need anything else besides my tail, because as long as I have it I’ll have a nice spot in the safe
kelp and a meal from the rushing currents.

But one day a minnow came by our kelp patch. He wasn’t even bigger than my tail. Yet he could swim up
and down the ocean currents, even with a tail as small as his. He would swim right next to our kelp, in
big circles and figure eights, and say “Look at me I can swim fast in the big ocean’s current!” Every time I
tried to tell him how big and strong my own tail was, he would swim out of sight of the kelp. I wanted to
chase him down so he could see just how big and strong my tail is. But he was good at slipping through
the currents, so I couldn’t get to him from where I was holding on.

“It’s okay, I have everything I need here while he has to swim around to get his food,” I told myself. I
didn’t need to be able to swim through the currents. The ocean currents are usually nice to me. But still,
day after day he would come to our kelp patch and mock me with his swimming. “Your tail isn’t as
strong as mine if you can’t even swim against the current!” he would say to me. I tried not to listen to
him, but my tail wanted the minnow to say how big and strong it is. Still he kept on swimming just past
my reach.

So one day the current got tired and didn’t flow as fast as he usually does. The minnow came back as
always and swam circles around the kelp. “Look at me your tail is as weak as the kelp!” he jeered. “My
tail is so much stronger the kelp patch should belong to me!”

I concentrated every bit of my tail, and let go. I pushed and pushed as hard as I could with my tail that
was used to holding on, and wiggled my body through the water. He kept swimming and swimming and
swimming, but I kept pushing and pushing my tail until his tail started to get tired. He had to stop and
rest his tail, but there was no kelp here to hide him.

“Ha! See how much stronger and curlier my tail is than yours! Now don’t bother my kelp ever again!” I
declared. He was too tired to make a response, so I decided to go back. But as I turned around, where
was back? I couldn’t see my kelp anywhere. I didn’t know where it went. All of a sudden, a shadow
descended upon the both of us.

Gulp. That was it.