We had coexisted in both modes of transport, hitchhiking and the sailing. Spatially. On another lateral plane, the rest of the world, the people driving past you or the people on the plane above, the people in their busy, industrious fast lives. Neither side can comprehend. Although we can all forget. Our enormous capacity to forget. As women in childbirth, the pain soon dulls, and they have a beautiful bouncing baby on their knee and willingly go through the most horrific pain again and again and perhaps again.
On the boat, hours of watching the wind indicator, the three of us, eyes glued to it, as though a fire a tv, a candle. The eyes willing the trade winds to blow their gust of breath, all in one, blow us on. The glassiness of the ocean to dissipate, the small ruffles to begin, the troughs to form, the incessant rocking to cease. Yet it does occur, eventually, the wind comes up, the sails are hoisted, the boat cuts neatly through the water. The state of becalment is relegated, almost immediately, to the past. He bounces down the companion way to pour each a drink, vodka and warm juice in tall plastic glasses.
Speed. Slow. Sailing is slow. Arrival by natural means. A natural crossing of latitudes, of travelling between hemispheres. Living the journey. We could say ‘the wind blew us here’. We certainly had time to get acclimatised, our arrival expected. Unlike flying where one disembarks the plane after only a few hours to find themselves in an entirely new time. Unnatural. Learn to live slow, sail fast. To live each hour slowly, to fill it.
It could be the ultimate freedom. Fresh to the ditch, ready for immediate pick up, thumb hung out with what we hope is a cheerful yet determined manner...I throw out what I can, and he throws out whatever boyish dreams men latch onto. His guitar front and centre, people will stop because of that. We talk, people drop water off to us, we sing, throw stones....our thumb always out. A car stopping surprises us, now we have forgotten our actuality, the reverse lights on it is coming back, we run, but not too fast to scare them, throw our bags in and into the moving future. As the miles whisk us on, our time spent waiting is left, our weariness drops behind, and we wonder on. We are reliant upon the stranger, their kindness. Sailing reliant upon the wind. In a sense left up to the mercies of the gods, of the elements, of what is all around. Speed is not the goal, the goal is to move. As with the wind, to move forward..to be in motion. The dust at your feet, the bitumen beside, the hot metal as we pile in, the wind as we flood forward. to our next destination, in motion (vita in motu )a happy place to be, anticipation of the unknown.
