Chapter 6: Cruising Around the World
At Sea
Eight days crossing the Pacific Ocean from La Paz, Mexico to Hawaii.
Having lived most of my life on land, living on the water is hard to describe. My powers of description have been formed by my experiences of land life.
The Pacific Ocean is so persuasive that it can change you with its motion alone. Within the ship your body follows its lead. There is always a feeling of rocking, you are poured this way and that by the breathing ocean.
There is the water, its metallic shaken brightness, a corenet of clouds and sky. Land doesn't stop your line of sight. Your brain is not required to interpret objects. Water moves you and at the same time changes the way you think.
What is the color of the ocean? There are layers of different blues descending to the depths that brush the tops of the deepest canyons. Blended, they would be called ultramarine. But that is a word, not the moving reality.
Our ship has become a time machine. At the stern, you can see time move into the past for 7 miles and at the bow you can see time 7 miles into the future. But these are landlubber thoughts, time really is not here. You can see no end or beginning.
“... look to the sea, to the sky, to what is unintelligible and distantly near.” Henry Miller
Strangely, it is at sea that I feel connected to living.
I am not alone onboard. There are 250 passengers and 200 crew. Our ship is a microcosm of the socio/ economic order humans make. There is the government, the economic structure, general maintenance and the views and desires of the people onboard. Most of the wealthier passengers live on the upper decks. These are the most expensive cabins and have large windows and balconies. The prices of the cabins as you descend to the mid and lower decks decrease until you arrive at the level where the hospitality crew live. We maintain a socio/ economic structure even on a ship. But, this little society cannot exist without all its participants. Like Buckminster Fuller said of Earth, it is a spaceship with many rooms, traveling around the sun. If there is a fire in one of those rooms the whole spaceship is in danger. It is the same with our ship.
Starting with the Captain. He is the government and the decision maker. He has the safety of everyone on board and the ship in his hands. Then there are his crew, carrying out specific functions, engineering, healthcare, general maintenance, electronics, navigation, safety and managing the hospitality workers who are responsible for food preparation, cleaning, sanitation and garbage collection. Finally, the passengers are the bank that pays for all this, the salaries, the fuel, the food, and whatever has to be bought to keep the ship running and maintained.
Yet, there is something more powerful, something that wipes away the organizing of humans. As our ship glides along, rocking gently with the swells, suddenly there is a thump!! The Pacific Ocean is making us aware of her presence. When she pounds us gently with a wave our ship vibrates and sounds like a drum, (just a gentle pounding like a cat playing with a mouse.) She is around us and under us (14,000 feet), and she can crush us anytime. She is letting us pass at twelve and one half knots (12 mph), for now. She can summon waves of up to 30 feet and winds of over 100 mph. We are a toy, allowed to travel on her vastness, a curiosity, almost ignored. Only land can stop her, temporarily. She wears that down given time. She is larger than all the continents fitted together. We are in her realm. We don't have a say. There is no freedom of speech, choice of government or economic status here. The Ocean is the law and you float with her consent.
White peaks flashing like fireflies in the distance. Be aware of the gulls, silvery fish arrows flying over the tops of the waves.
S. Caumont
