The sea make me silent

The sea                                                                                                                                                                            The time of the cat and the time of the sail silently converge                                                                                    Both anachronistic and timeless                                                                                                                    Surrendered to the instant that is one                                                                                                                    That does not change, as the sea does not change                                                                                         Always the same and always another.

The sea makes me silent. Gently it wash the hours, the minutes. The time of the sea is different, it is a time of waves and miles, a time made of water, which can change. A time that is indifferent to our clock hands, to calendar dates, to the separation of days, or nights.

I think I love to travel, and to love, and to play and laugh and read and write, because they are all activities that one is engaged in that time. Within the trip, within the hours by foot or by bicycle, or on a motorcycle, in the high mountain treks and the hours around the fire, in the mornings or afternoons and nights of love and in the moments of friendship, that diluted time is also there. We know it, of course. It is the present that extends, calm, marked by the rhythm of the mountains or the people, caresses or kisses, laughter and silence. Here, at the sea, that time seems invincible. There is nothing that brings back us to the days, and suddenly September ends and I look at the shore, incredulous.

And just as the sea imposes its own time made of eternity, it erases the words. And you have to learn again, to speak and think, learn to say in another way. The fact of sailing makes that’s one not remains only in the contemplation of the sea. One lives it. One feels it. One learns it. I think it's a bit like falling in love. I´m never tired of looking at it, listening to it, I´m never stop surprising me, discovering it a little more every day, and everything I discover about it makes me love it a little more, every day. Today, it is like evidence, the sea and me, even if it entered so recently in my life.

Despite our experience we have made 3 "important" journeys.  Those were between 120 and 280 nautical miles, about two or three days without seeing land. That is similar to crossing the desert. In all those trips there were moments without wind: sometimes 10, or 12, or up to 18 hours. These are worrying moments, the ship rocks, from one side to the other, and if the sails are haul down, it makes dissonant noises, out of tune. Of course, one takes the opportunity to jump into the water, the children play as if they were not suspended above 3000 meters of abyss, and rest, take a nap (if it is possible). The first few hours are easier. Then they become worrying. Is it possible that the wind will never blow again? A great desert, calm and threatening, without dunes or movement, and so evident that one begins to doubt if this can change. But we want to think that it could, that it will change, at some point. We want to trust the wind and the sea, we want to wait for it, endure that time that seems to prolong more and more.

I know, it is not necessary to endure the suspense, we always can start the engine, remember or at least create the illusion that we own everything, with our oil and our technology, and that nothing can stop us. ¨But it would be a pity. Because, softly, you begin to hear a song and that song of the Mediterranean and the Tyrrhenian Sea is not the same, and you can see slight waves that are drawn on the flat water. The flag timidly begins to vibrate, we listen, we observe, we hardly dare to move. Then the wind vane asserts itself, announces a wind from the south, or from the north. She that spent so many hours turning around seems suddenly to have recovered her spirits. And that is magical. Depending on the wind, waiting for that moment, being able to receive it… Then, it blows hard, very strong, the waves form. It is a roller-coaster without guarantees or safety belts, you go from surfing to climbing, you climb the water dunes and then go down, some waves pass over us and we laugh. It is still summer and we are not cold, we are surprised, It still enjoyable.

And there it is, the sea, like life itself, uncertain, unpredictable, full of surprises, dancing to the rhythm of both changing and capricious times. He is stronger than us and we know it. We have to learn to sense it and understand it, read it, listen to it. We have to manage to accommodate ourselves to its times and its music to live it fully. And that's what I like.