While the Engine Wasn't Running
The boat took a break, as did I.
What’s up everybody, hope your summers been as good as mine’s been so far. If you follow me through notes you know it’s been an absolute whirlwind for me these past couple of weeks.
Since June I’ve gone on an impromptu camping trip, an impromptu music festival and the crew and myself just took our beloved boat back to her home from the shipyard.
This is maybe the busiest and most fun summer in recent memory. Even despite the current situation I find myself in.
In case your new here and haven’t read my previous piece I’m a tallship sailor, and our boats out of action for a little while. I’m not going to lie, that situation seemed pretty dire when I first found out we weren’t sailing this season. I remember being in that Airbnb somewhere in Baltimore with my crewmates for the Tallships America conference when we got the news broken to us. Believe me when I tell the mood shifted almost instantly. I’ve spoken to some degree about this in my last essay, so I won’t dwell on it here, but now that the boats back at her homeport, there’s more hope than ever.
Even the transit back, we were all expecting thunderstorms for the entire weekend trip. We saw them all around us but somehow never got caught in them. I’ll never forget that first night watch though. The sky was overcast all day and stuck around during the night hours. It was the darkest night watch I’ve ever been on. Not a single star, no moon, just blackness, save for the ambient lights on shore in front of us. It was crushing, suffocating even and I said as much to the watch officer. Soon as I said it, it was bright as day. Heat lightning brought all the color back to the world. Freakiest bit of weather I’ve ever experienced in that part of the bay.
Somehow everything that could’ve gone our way— it broke in our favor. We even had an escort of around twenty dolphin and stingrays on our way to our home river. Nature itself heralded our safe return home, like it was telling us everything’s going to be fine.
The dolphin sightings meant something really deep to me personally. I only ever see dolphin in the bay when I meet a special somebody.
We met the weekend before, at a music festival in Virginia Beach. A festival I didn’t even plan on being at. Craziest part? I ran into her twice!
I took another guys place on that trip I hadn’t met. Something I could’ve only done because the boat wasn’t operating. We were there for four days, and the festival ran for two. The first two days we became staff favorites at a tiny boardwalk bar, after I saw a server get accosted by a table who had waited too long to get their food. The audacity of this table, to say they were starving and that they were leaving, after this server has your food in his hands, was unmatched. “They sat down after us and got their food before us” they said. “Guys it’s not personal, the kitchens having issues right now.” We’ll call him Matt for sake of the story. “Yeah, it is personal,” her name was probably Karen.
I was the only one in my group who witnessed that part of the interaction. I got his attention and told him to his face, that ain’t your fault man, that was absurd. My other friends had returned from their smoke break and myself and Matt retold the story to them. And needless to say we all hooked him up for his trouble. Bartender hooked us up in return. 3 shots of comped tequila later and we wound up at the festival, 2 hours after the doors.
I had never heard of any of the bands playing, but I’m the kind of guy who likes to see the bands with my own eyes not on a screen. Friends didn’t feel the same way so I took a room key and wandered drunk on my own adventure. That’s when I met her and her friends. She actually recognized me from the drink line, and I was immediately adopted into the group. They all wanted to find their friend who was up forward in the crowd. So me being the six-foot tree trunk I am, I led the way through the crowd. We found her friend and settled in not too long after.
It was an awesome set. I felt bad at first because she was so tiny I wasn’t sure she could see over the people in front of her. That didn’t stop us from dancing together though. Her friends all ended up loving me, though I didn’t realize it at the time. I left and fought the crowd through twenty blocks on the boardwalk. We both got back to our rooms not knowing if we’d ever see each other again.
Well son-of-a-bitch we found each other again the next day!
I got her number, and we just spent two incredible days at the boats homeport.
She’s also reading this when it drops. Hello my love <3.
It’s a reminder I suppose. That things will work out exactly as their meant to. That life can unfold into something beautiful when you learn to drop any expectations for how things will end up.
I know I’m not in the place financially where I need to be. I’m six months removed from the best job I’ve ever gotten outside of the tall ship. I’m living off of bitcoin and stock returns at the moment, and I’m betting my financial future on meme coins called Retardio and Fartcoin. It is by no means sound financial planning, but where has the conventional financial wisdom gotten anyone recently?
All I know is that spiritually I’m where I need to be right now. And beyond all evidence to the contrary, everything will break in my favor.
I’ll see you guys out there.