“There he goes again! See him splash?” asked Ed McGlynn, his gaze fixed serenely on the ocean from a bench sporting his family name on Belvoir Avenue in Beach Haven. “That’s a big fish. Maybe a tuna out of his territory, or even a young whale,” he speculated. “Too far for me to reach, but close enough to make a big splash.”

BEACH BUDS: Ed McGlynn spent the morning of his 91st birthday the way he spends every morning, with a stroll to the beach with his best pal, Butch the cat. (Photo by Maureen Koerwer)

The autumn sun glimmered across the water, which seemed to stretch infinitely in every direction, wrapping everything in its expanse up in each single, present moment.

He reminisced on the simple days of his youth. “Dad and I – when I was a kid – used to fish on that jetty,” he said,…