
Forever…if not, see you.
The house is uncommonly silent, almost eerie. Quite so. I am, afterall, its warmth. When I’m in the house it is cosy, comfortable, complete as it can be in the circumstances. You know the feeling, returning home after two weeks holiday. I feel the house sigh.
Within half an hour I’ll be in bed, but first, a cup of tea.
There’s no mail because I stopped its delivery a couple of months ago, knowing I wouldn’t be home. I’ll turn on the heating, check out all the rooms, and dump my bag in the closet, having first removed my kettle. Yep, from my bag!
Hell, the bed looks inviting. It’s true, I can fall asleep on any bed but this is my own bed. I’ll sleep perfect. It’s not even a specially made bed, doesn’t use water or electronics, just a slatted wooden baseboard, and teak headboard matching the solid bedroom furniture.
The mattress has known only the weight of one body since 1994. There have been other beds that have excited me when sleeping alone, nights spent in a bunk, most times wet, most times cold, most times being rocked like a marble in a saucer, but this is that bed, the one she…ah, but that’s the kettle chirping away.
I have not missed the whistle of my kettle. I’ll tell you why. I take it everywhere. It’s the one constant in my life, whether afloat or land locked, it whistles the same tune.
I’ll give you this: The kettle has been harder to transport since 9/11. Airport security being what it is, I go to great lengths to speak to airline security, explaining that I have a kettle in my carry-on bag. With all the troubles and tight security could I, just this once, not take the kettle? The answer would be yes, if security decided doing so was a threat to passengers. Otherwise, I travel light. Two pair of trousers, four shirts, a warm jacket, and a swan-neck kettle with a whistling lid. It’s an old kettle, these days filled with just enough water for a single cup of tea. God knows, it should have been replaced a lifetime ago but it never has been and while it still whistles it won’t be; not unless the bottom drops out, which it may well do one of these days. The security agent, accompanied by a sniffer dog holds my kettle above his head, shakes it, let’s the dog sniff it. Completely satisfied, he allowed me to pass through. Collect my belt, put on my shoes, feel relieved.
I’ve come home to do some sailing. Real sailing.

Many yachtsmen have interesting tales to tell. I have none. Sure, I’ve been in some fixes, saved a mariner or two, not at sea, simply by advising on how to properly prepare for the ocean. Dad always told me, when looking to buy a yacht, select one that will take care of you when you cannot take care of it.
The weekend sailor commonly has aspirations above his station. The men (and women) who believe the sea is not at all what some say it is, and without years of preparation, planning, and preparing the yacht to take care of him, or her, believe they can cross the Atlantic safely.
Trust me, there are as many stupid women at sea as there are men.
This doesn’t mean there aren’t those different women at sea. I’ve been saved by a woman, near broke her own neck in the attempt. I see her from time to time. She never reminds me of my stupidity. Very gracious.
There may be fine sailors among you, or maybe not. In fact, I dare say that very few of you have sailed across an ocean wider than a bath tub. Good for you, keep it that way. It’s no fun. People like me, well we haven’t the common sense we were born with.
Some of us leave homes, children, wives, and parents, just to sail a yacht into some bleak and dreary corner where Satan spends his time amusing us with mischievous weather patterns.
I’m not a kindred spirit others who sail. I’m in another league of skill. Higher. Much higher.
It hasn’t always been this way but sixty-years-single-handed-sailing has made me so. I know now it will always be. Call me conceited. But in difficulties at sea, yes, you’d want to be on my yacht. I’ll never be a Francis Chichester but I’ve felt the same fear and survived the same oceans.
I’ll keep you safe.
It’s the loved ones who were not on my yacht that would die. How I hate myself for that.
Many of my friends don’t call me. I’ve become tiresome; relentlessly so. I think those who read me get that now; those that come by regularly. Which is why I sometimes like to meet up with a strange face in a bar; preferably one that has had several more beers than me and will listen to anything I have to say. I try not to do the same on the page. Often failing. But relentless I continue to be.
The kettle, which I’ve made so much of, its weird, right? Well you need to understand the attraction of loneliness before you understand what the purpose of the kettle is in my life. It goes where I go and is as close to me as Wilson was to Tom Hanks.
I’ve never wanted to be a man who lived for other men. I’ve been the kind of man that many times forgot his responsibilities, all for the sake of adventure, only to find frustration and fear and disappointment.
There is nothing to compare with sailing through a life learning how to surmount obstacles, combine hearts, and understand equally the value of skill and the surety of a compass.
I have loved with such passion and found in loving reserves of energy and motivation that I have never found sailing a transatlantic yacht. I have been beaten near to death by exhaustion and wanted to survive because of love.
Before the end of the week and before the barometer drops, I’ll be gone. I won’t miss your visits to read me, or wonder anything about you. But know this: I’ve been grateful. Even touched in my heart by your interest.
I’ll be off doing what I do best, looking for trouble. I’ll be ready when it comes, and it will, in the form of rain and wind and darkening skies, combined with a swelling ocean guaranteed to set my heart pumping harder.
Tonight, I’ll sleep in a bed that has known only the weight of one body for far too long. When I wake, you’ll all be far from my thoughts, but I won’t, in my arrogance, go without saying — thank you.
I don’t know if forever is waiting on this ocean, if not, see you then…

