Part 1: The hole!

Generally, when I go sailing, I acquire a greater appreciation for the many small things around me. The rhythm that comes from a gently rolling sailboat with nothing but an occasional sail flapping in the wind or water lapping against the bow to break the near silence, affords an inner calm that means small local details can fill the space vacated by the usual worldly minutiae. It’s not unusual to find oneself observing the patterns of the waves, the gradation of the light across distant clouds and the patterns made by birds in flight, which affords them a level of importance in my world, not afforded to them when I’m on land doing my day things (at least not before my conversion to Eco Warrior status).

There is an enforced rhythmic change that is beyond self control – it just happens. I love that state. I tend to play on it to move my thoughts to whatever I choose to think about, not what I have to think about and to do so in a more focused and relaxed way. After a while I can appreciate the colors of the waves while contemplating the greater significance of the most important things in my more normal world. I like this sort of introspection. I like the time I get to appreciate things previously left in limbo or unrecognized. I can’t tell you it leads to sweeping changes (there aren’t too many egg sandwich and caffeinated coffee life shifts available), but it definitely leads to a fuller appreciation of what means most to me and how wrong some of my priorities can sometimes be.

Surprisingly, even through the storms of the last week, I was able to move into a more contemplative state (have I mentioned the storm of last week, or of this week – either?). Of course there were times during those howling winds when the factor of fear might have kicked in and my focus swayed towards self-preservation and doing deals with God. Without wishing to get too deep in my own shit here, I did find it interesting to try and answer this simple question while dealing with 70 mile winds – if I weren’t in this world anymore, whose life would be really affected by my absence. I don’t mean whose life would have a hole in it, a hole I currently fill, I mean where there would be a substantial impact and a definite need for a sustained change to their behavior to fill in for my absence.

One of my conclusions was that there are some people who I want to be much closer to, not so I can cause them pain should I pop off ahead of them, but that is a bit of an additional benefit, like an unintended positive consequence (joking – don’t get concerned), but people who I don’t get the time with and I really want  to. Of course there are people who I give time to (physical and even emotional) and frankly, if I wasn’t about, nothing of significance would change for them. I’m affording them way more significance than I should. So, a conscious rebalancing might be in order, but having failed to answer emails for so long now, I may not have anyone left to give any time to.

I’m not sure sailing the Southern Atlantic is necessary to do this sort of reflection, just getting stuck in an elevator shaft or watching episodes of Real Housewives of Highland Park might provide the mental state and space to use for reflection and you can save yourselves the thrills and spills of being flung through the air at the whim of the South Atlantic.

Pip pip