Saturday, April 16, 2011

Letter to Ourselves

Dear Future Brittany & Scott -

The uninhabited island to some might be a nightmare, to others it might be a mystery but to you, right now, it is a dream. I want you to remember these feelings, this peace, this calm, this serenity...

You are at Big Sand Cay, your staging point for your hop over to the Dominican Republic. Here, you are bothered by no one and nothing other than the gentle sound of waves crashing to shore, the cries of sea birds in the night, and the breeze as it caresses your beautiful little boat which rocks gently with the swell. I want you to remember the water - the shockingly azure color that it is - and how, in certain light (particularly dusk and dawn) it actually takes your breath away and seems to glow.

Remember how it feels to not have to answer to anyone or anything. To not hear a single voice over the radio, to have no plan and to just be. Remember lying naked on the deck, reading lazily under the hot midday sun and, just when you can't take the heat any more, jumping in the water and the instant relief it brings as it envelops you. You swim like fish around your boat, diving to the bottom and up again. Floating on your backs for minutes at a time without a care in the world. The bottom of the anchorage here is nothing but sand for miles, and looking down at it from above you see nothing but gentle ripples caused by the ocean swell. It was here that Brittany first made bagels - actual home-made bagels - a feat that both of you enjoy tremendously, particularly at breakfast.

Remember what it is like to walk along an empty, pristine, white sand beach as the waves crash over your feet and your toes sink into the soft, almost porous, sand. You had a lovely run together along this beach and finished it off with a dip in your own private swimming hole. You find and pontificate on all sorts of interesting flotsam that has washed up to shore. An old steel drum, a used pyrotechnic shell, a high heel sandal, a refrigerator door, a hard hat, a buoy, oodles of old line and all sorts of other items whose stories you'll never know. Remember how lovely it was to lay on the bow and dangle one leg over the side and how the sun speckled through the openings in your straw hat. Remember how much time you had to think, to reflect, to read, to dream, to wonder and invent...

Remember how lovely it was to be just the two of you, on your boat, in your own little tropical paradise.

Love,

Present Brittany & Scott
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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow...

Albert said...

Your best post yet. We thought we lost you both, and we did - to heaven.

fairwinds4linda said...

Very nicely said. I can feel every moment you write about.

Anonymous said...

I will soon know that feeling....
thank you for the preview.

Anonymous said...

Just a quick note from a family of Chicago-based sailors...since discovering your blog a few weeks ago, we've been living our lives vicariously through your writing and photography. While we admire the adventure you have undertaken, we are most taken by your writing. This is one of the most well-written blogs we've encountered. Keep up the great work and keep those posts coming.

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