Apr 23, 2001
Odd dream
I dreamt last night that I was crewing an enormous fishing boat on the Atlantic, responsible for bringing it into harbour, navigating by the stars – only I got distracted by the meteorite showers over the weekend, and ended up taking us into Caracas instead. The captain’s wife was not impressed, because there was only condensed milk for the tea, and the crew (which included my brother’s girlfriend’s brother, two members of my department and a couple of blogging types) were pale-lipped and silent. We entered the harbour so fast that it felt like we were just skimming across the water. I leant out over the bowsprit and touched the necklaces of lights reflected in the calm ocean.
In the early nineties, I spent a summer crewing the a sail training vessel circumnavigating the UK, taking groups of probationers, ex-offenders and young people who were at risk (usually from drugs or homelessness) on ten day trips.
It’s a 92′ Victorian pilot schooner, a classic, beautiful ship, and a pleasure to sail, though bloody hard work. Most of the trainees had never been on the ocean before, offshore or inshore, and it was sometimes a bit stressful trying to get things done. If things went well, at the beginning of the week, the four crew would be doing all the work, explaining what we did as we went along, from putting up sails to navigating, polishing the brasses, building weather charts and making the tea. By the end of the week, the trainees would be doing all of that.
The skipper was called Hugh, though we all called him Shuggie. He was Scottish, late thirties (though he looked older) and monosyllabic. He always had a roll-up clamped between his lips, and its state was a good indicator of the gravity of a situation. When we hit bad weather in the open ocean, and the whole boat was heeling at an angle not conducive to sleep or gravity, the trainees would often get scared, and panicky – which sometimes translated into agression and violence. Violence is something you don’t want on a relatively small boat, out at sea, so situations had to be rapidly diffused. I would tell the trainees to watch Shuggie’s cigarette. When we were in bad wether, it would remain there, clamped between his teeth in a Clint Eastwood style. As soon as he felt the weather was turning, even if the swells were still massive and the boat was still further to one side than it felt like it should be, he’s whip out his zippo and light it again. And then everyone knew it was going to be ok.
My main job was to oversee the navigation and the charts – my love of maps plus fascination with meteorology coming into good use – and it was bizarre to be listening to the nightly shipping forecast and actually using it. Actually needing it. Even now, when I hear it, I still mentally trace the coastline of the UK, following the names around, clockwise.
There’s a longer story about sailing into the Corryvrechan whirlpool, plus sheep-ticks on the paps of Jura, an eerie confession on the graveyard watch and a horrific realisation as we rounded the Calf of Man, but I can’t find the words today. Sorry, am fluey and delerious. Hate everything. Going back to bed.
