COM-440 Blog #2: “Do You Want to Build a Wall?”
Let’s play a numbers game: the lax girls are 13, the D-1 girls are 12, Pip caught a 10-pound tuna, I threw up five times, and I now have rule number 4 of sailing: make sure your course is made good when your crush is relieved! I took over on helm around high-noon Wednesday after I had 2 hot-dogs with ketchup for lunch, the second straight day I devoured that course after Pip made borsch the day before and I had three bowls of it. But our small schooner stood less than 58 miles southeast of Санкт-Петербург, and that was when the water began to turn horrendous: I tacked masterfully, going from what I believe was 320° past due north and nearing due northeast, then I tried to hold everything in while Pip prepared a fishing line starboard-stern. “Are you sure that line is strong enough?” I asked him. “It looks pretty thin.”
“Space-age technology,” he replied. “It’s monofilament approved to 80 pounds.”
About 25 minutes after I relieved Collin on lookout, Pip made true to his word and reeled in an 8-pound Bonito tuna, the first fish caught on the Howard in the Gulf of Mexico since at least 1966. He turned it into ceviche the next day, but that’s where this story begins.
We mustered at 2:30 that Wednesday afternoon for a class held by Pip and his baritone vocals, where we sang a few sea shanties at midship, but all the meanwhile I wasn’t too worried about the hot dogs despite feeling my head fill up during wake-ups (my quarters in that fish-hold does not like me at all!) I knew I would stay on-deck for as long as possible, especially during the Bravo and Charlie watches. But the weather had other ideas when Charlie took over at 6, and Daren asked me to throw on a harness; I complied, but not before preparing myself since I couldn’t bear the foc’s’le for even a few minutes over chili and crackers. I sat starboard on the butterfly hatch for as long as I could, waiting for the waves to take our boat in every direction, having recently spoken with a look-out Cariel slightly aft than normal, when…at 6:45…it hit me.
I felt a contraction in my chest, leapt off the hatch, unclipped my harness off the jack-line at Cariel’s behest, raced port, and released everything I could overboard. I felt so embarrassed to fall sick while Daren was on active watch, but there was more to come: after the first contraction, I unzipped the jacket of my aquatic suit and released a second batch. I couldn’t tell the colour, I would like to think it was red from the chili and possibly the borsch. I released a smaller conglomerate a few moments later, grabbed the shrouds (#BeatESU!) at starboard-midship, and made perfect eye contact with the Moon. And this, I attest, is when I realised how much my friends actually mean to me — I began reciting names and repeating a personal mantra about them several times…and it helped me get through what I told Brad was one of the worst nights of my life so far. It wouldn’t be an hour before Alpha were on, thus I began aft at lookout with my stomach crazed.
Before that, however, Daren found it in her heart to come forward. “How are you feeling?” she asked me. “Are you alright?”
“I don’t know what it is”, I replied uncertainly. She must have recognised what was happening forward despite leaving Evan on helm.
“Well, getting that bile out of your system should help,” she replied. I made eye contact with her in full discomfort over what had just occurred. Hopefully, Daren could provide any physical assistance and emotional support possible. “Just make sure you drink a lot of water, make sure you’re not dehydrated, and you should be okay,” she continued in her thick panhandle accent.
“I’ll try and stand watch,” I uncomfortably replied. “Thank you so much. You don’t understand how much this means to me right now.”
I was extremely grateful for her genuine concern for my well-being with watch coming shortly. “That’s what we’re here for,” she replied with a smile.
I thanked her again — and the rest of Charlie — right when we were about to take over. Somehow, I kept my composure for my hour on lookout before I relieved the helm steering 295°. I knew I would improve quicker with more time on deck, but Christine had other ideas for me. “Are you cold right now?” she asked about 15 minutes in.
“I’d rather be cold than wet,” I replied as I felt the harness extend over my legs. I was referencing the numerous times I had been splashed earlier that day. I was all ready to keep rolling when, at 9:28, she realised something unusual. “Are you wearing shorts?” she asked.
“You bet!” I replied confidently.
“Why don’t you go downstairs and put some more clothes on?”
The last thing I wanted to do was return to the fish-hold. I ended up complying after she told me she would relieve me for the time being. “Steering 2–9–5,” we exchanged.
After it happened again downstairs, and I was still thinking about everyone back home, I went down to the fish-hold to grab longer pants, returned on-deck, and headed forward after a couple moments; and luckily she was still steering 295°. I was now on standby-lookout for the remainder of our watch; I returned port-midship and again clutched the shrouds (#BeatESU!!) for support. Again, I thought about my Lakers and was torn: do I sleep or stay on-deck?
