Now What?
There is a song. A song that Emília introduced me to, somewhere in the very beginning. She asked me if I knew the band. Gave me an earpod, listened to it together. I remember trying to pay attention to the lyrics, but dozing off with other thoughts. It was only much later that I came to love the song with all my heart. It became our song. Cabin two, later five. The song that tore my heart apart by feeding me memory after memory as I sat alone in the living room, playing it loudly on that bleak Sunday afternoon. Tears rolled down my cheeks how I prefer them: unseen. I didn’t belong here anymore; I was a bird that had learnt how to fly, but was now being forced back into the golden cage. I was supposed to move forward, not back. I just knew: nothing was going to be the same ever again.
My friends all wanted to see me again, but I just wasn’t ready for it. They said they understood, but I knew they didn’t. They could perhaps understand that such a thing could be hard, but not why, how, the essence. And that’s not their fault, you must have experienced such a thing to know what it's like. I was selfish, and shut them off a bit.
Thanks to Easter I didn’t have to go to school till Wednesday. When I did, everything was so... normal, as if SaS had never happened. As if it had been a dream.
I noticed how little we actually do in a school day. How quickly we move from one subject to the next, get fed little snippets and then have to do the real work at home. What a waste of all the hours we spend at school. During SaS I could do a chapter a day, if I worked hard. And just focus on one subject until I got it. Well, only two more years and a few months to survive until Freedom.
On Friday I had my coming back, and in a way, goodbye party. All the sassers were invited, plus my friends. It was very good to see everyone again, and it felt so… familiar, trusted, safe. We had an amazing evening.
The next morning a group of us went off to Amsterdam, to our beloved Regina Maris. She was there, on the exact same spot as she had been, six long months ago.
All I can say is, there had been no use in cleaning that ship. It was a total mess. Repainting, repairs, new stuff, all for the summer season. They said we’d lived like pigs, but, those toilets definitely didn’t look as if they got cleaned twice a day. And the fridge… well. We were there to help with attaching the sponsored sails for a festival in Hamburg, and did the schooner and mainsail.
Being back on the ship was like returning to a house. A house full of colourful memories of life and laughter. But now it’s empty, the walls are crumbling, poison ivy growing through the broken windows. You trace your finger over a dusty windowsill, thinking of it all, feeling at home, yet knowing it’s over. It isn’t yours anymore.
In the days that followed I visited work, did some school, and returned to the ship to hang in the yard to fasten the squaresail. With SaS being over, we could talk freely with Sam about everything, which was funny. I’m on holiday now, if you were wondering. The Dutch don’t get Easter, but two weeks at the end of April/beginning of May. I developed my film, only to find all of it empty; something had gone wrong with the camera. Luckily I have a few thousand digital photos.
Exactly two weeks after we started the motor in IJmuiden, I was at work again, serving vegan wraps and sandwiches. And it just felt so… normal, as if nothing had ever happened. Yesterday I booked my tickets to the Azores, to go with sassers to visit sassers, before exploring Lisbon and the south of Portugal with them and joining Kika on her way to France. That’s why I was back at work so soon (I'm paying for all of it myself). I might not have a lot of time to travel, but every moment I can, I will. And perhaps a Tall Ships Race here and there? If you, the reader, own a ship or know someone who needs people, I’d love to do more sailing, so do tell me.
Just the other day I realised how long six months actually are, yet where did they go? From Amsterdam to Tenerife felt like centuries, yet on the other hand we were like, “Wow, a month already?” Back then it had all just started, but it feels like yesterday. From Tenerife till say, Aruba, went fairly slowly, felt like two thirds of the trip. San Blas kinda hovered in the middle, till boom snap Panama Cuba Bermuda Azores gone! Just like that. What happened to that half of the trip?
It’s all over now, and although I’m mostly used to it, my mind still hasn’t fully comprehended it. I’ll be walking through the garden, smell a smell that used to be so familiar, but now seems from another life. Feel the thickness of our toilet paper (the layers lessened by the island), reminding me of my privilege every day. There are moments that I still drift, lost on the oceans of memory. Feeling purposeless, because on the ship there was always something to do, and a reason for it.
This chapter of my life is over now, and a new one has begun. This ship has sailed far away, forever chasing the sun.