Friendship with the kettle

A piece of prose

This piece of prose was inspired by the beautiful writings of Whye Waite at Sea Stories

It’s a restless, hungry sensation, sailing.

I remember it was a bright day, with no cloud to obscure the sun’s warmth. I wanted to run down the hill, but the weight of my hold-all and the steepness of the slope would have seen me falling head over heels.

Everything growing at the roadside seemed more livid, greener, and lusher than even the smugness of the Scottish countryside could have foretold. I could see the harbor, the masts of yachts, and fishing boats over the roofs below.

I’d spent one too many mornings procrastinating about whether I should head back out to sea. Leave the doorstep of my home, go to the crossroads, pass by the street sign, keeping to the sidewalk, look up at the clock tower, and feel the calling. I’m already a thousand miles behind.

I hoped for clear water, calm seas and eager to hear the rushing of white water off the bow. To hold a compass in my hand, feel it connected to me the same way a horse is attached to a plow. At sea, where every morning starts again, clean, having left tears, whether comic or tragic, back under the streetlights with the barking dogs.

Returning to the water, loved since a child, catching minnows from the harbor wall. Summers that rolled in and out with no complications, waiting for the smiles of one man, made shy by his laughter, held safe in his arms. I grew strong under castle walls, mountain shadows, and tides that came and went. To become a man alone in the hollow of the night, with only stars shattering the silence.

A man can forget his responsibilities for the sake of adventure, finding too often only frustration, fear, and disappointment. A sailor needs to understand loneliness and bring about a friendship with the kettle.