THE WATER IS BUBBLING

Every time the sun goes behind a cloud, I realize how cold and colorless the world would be without it.

Tahiti is 30 nautical miles away. I can see the outline of it’s shape rising up from the sea and disappearing into the sky. I will sail past it through the evening. Beneath a moon as big as pie. Come morning, I will be anchored in the waters of Mo’orea, the island just west of Tahiti that exists thanks to the tail of a giant gecko (mo’o).

I am looping around loops of loopyness. That’s not even a word but you know what I mean. I kind of feel like a piñata that’s been bashed around by candy-hungry kids with a bat and everything inside of me is about to spill out and what’s left of me is just going to be dangling from the mast, empty. Sleep, I could use some, a far away sleep.

The Tuamotus were hard to get to and just as hard to leave. I never imagined that it would take almost four days to get back down. I mean, I knew the high was coming, I just didn’t know how high the high was gonna get. It got so high that life was a looking glass. But all the winds are back now and the water is bubbling in the Iles Du Vent.

My favorite wench handle went overboard today. Did you hear that? Favorite! You should have heard the scream that came out of me when the wave stole and sank it down. I imagine it being added along to my mountain of treasures already buried in the deep. I imagine my treasures being guarded by a mean one-eyed fish named Itchy Bobbles. I imagine Itchy putting my wench on top of the pile like it’s a Christmas tree topper.

I can’t sail without a wench handle, really. Or I guess I could but nothing would be trimmed properly or hoisted fully. I have two other ones onboard, but they are made of heavy metal. They fall out of the wenches at the mast and shine so bright they blind, and weigh so much that I could use them as dumbbells. Or, I could use them as unsuspecting weapons, should a pirate or goblin or the monster in my melon, ever climb aboard. Or, I could turn them into spare hammers, or fish flashers, or anything but wench handles.

I really want chocolate. Lots of it. An entire bar of dark mint chocolate. In my mouth. Now. The closest thing I’ve got to that is my Himalayan salt pipe which currently has peppermint oil in it. And let me tell you what, I am hitting that pipe so hard, peppermint is coming out of all my little pores.

On the food note, the propane sensor is still possessed. I turn it on. A green light comes. Then clicks itself off. Then clicks on a bunch of other lights on the sensor. Then off. Then on. Then off. It took me 45 minutes just to boil water for coffee this morning. Anytime I got the green I turned the burner on. And it would stay for 1 second then burn out. Anyway, it was worth it. That coffee was good.

I can’t find any trace of a propane leak with my soap suds and my wrenches reveal all fittings are fitting real tight. I can tell you this though, and this is a truth that’s gonna sound like a lie, but after everything else failed, I got the propane to work long enough to sauté some vegetables, by smudging sage in the propane locker. And today, Cici sang a song to the propane tanks and the sensor worked long enough for me to make pasta.

I told y’all that Juniper is haunted! I think her Golden Shower ghost has exited the head and now resides in the galley.

Anyway, I need to disco my way out of here. It’s 3 a.m. and the swell is all whacko near shore. It’s as if the waves are going, “yes, yes, yes, yes, land, land, land, land, land,” in a bunch of different directions. And there are fish aggregating devices (FADs) everywhere and y’all know how much I love sailing near land at night.