Skip to main content

Back to the beach

Reflection from the beach II
When I was last here, in the same hostel, I went down to the beach, fighting the temptation to jump into the waves and reflecting on fear. Today I went back to the beach. The log wasn't there anymore, so I started walking along the beach instead. It struck me, as I walked toward the shipping cranes in the distant container terminal that I was longing to hop back on the ship! I had just finished reading Roxane Gay's "Hunger" which was quite raw, and left me feeling a little raw. "I'm attracted to the idea that the mind, the soul, can heal as neatly as bones. That if they are properly set for a given period of time, they will regain their original strength. Healing is not that simple. It never is."  (Chapter 82) We all have our woes, our baggage. I've realized that while it is very easy to forgive others and give them some slack, it's much harder to do that for ourselves. I can recommend this book, certainly, but save it for a day when you you're not missing your shipmates!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

I'll have a blue Christmas without you

One of my homework assignments for the forest therapy course is to find a “sitspot”, a place to sit with the natural world and allow nature to work its way in. My sitspot on the ship is in the bow of the U deck. When the crew is working on the deck, it can be quite noisy and some parts of the engine are noisy too. I am glad to have my fancy musician’s earplugs. They allow me to hear everything (even small details) but they lower the decibel level to protect hearing. I use these when I need to. But at the bow, there is a miraculous quiet, and I listen to the waves against the ship, watching the birds and the changing sky. On the starboard side in the early afternoon, or the portside in the morning, I find the most exquisite variations in blue. Perhaps I’ll see a greenish blue--let’s call it aqua, or a light greyish blue or on cloudy days a darker grey like a blackboard. I love to see the particular blue that falls somewhere between denim and royal blue with...

The adventure has begun...

The first weekend after school was very busy, packing up my home of 26 years and saying good bye. I couldn't have done it without the help! Thanks to Jannie, Emma, Lea, George, Donna, Richard, Jean, Cait, Kevin and Patricia, I became homeless in a gentle way. Thank you everybody!    I  got by with a little help from my friends...   (click here) On Canada Day, Kevin and I went to Rattlesnake Point, Crawford Lake and the Royal Botanical Gardens. What a lovely day! From July 2-5 we went camping with the O'Neill kids at the Pinery. What a beautiful beach, and even though we got sunburned, we both enjoyed being with the kids. While waiting to acquire my Chinese Visa in Toronto,  I stayed in luxury at Stephanie's house. This was the pillow on the bed. It was perfect.  When I got the visa, I took the Ontario Northland to Sudbury for a love-in with my Mom and my paddleboard. Mom helped me reduce my backpack load by 15lbs! It is now a mana...

Northwest Territories Part 1: Yellowknife

Yellowknife is a beautiful place! Unfortunately, there was a lot of smoke at first from a forest fire in the neighbourhood--it was quite a surprise when getting off the plane! Apparently the fire was about 40km away and sometimes blowing toward Yellowknife. It had abated in 2 days. My first night there, I met Leone and Clem of "Buffalo Nights Bed and Breakfast." Clem actually hunts buffalo, but hasn't for a while since it's too much meat. There was a gigantic taxidermied head of one of the "little" ones he got. The view from their house overlooks Great Slave Lake from a high rocky hill. So gorgeous! I stayed at Fred Henne Territorial Park for 5 days, on a rocky hill. I read 4 novels sitting down at the beach of Long Lake, which is, of course, long and also shallow and chilly. I took a picture of my first coffee made. I still didn't have fuel, so I got boiling water from the gatehouse. I placed it so you could see the veins of pink ...