This is the product of my on-board class in acrylic painting. The class was only an hour, but they let me take a few supplies back to my room and a few days later this happened. It’s a reproduction of a Van Gogh and I’m super proud, especially considering it’s the first time I’ve tried painting since high school. I think at home I would have had an anxiety attack spending five hours on something as “frivolous” and “selfish” as painting. (I know I have work to do on valuing things I enjoy.)
Today we arrived in the Sargasso Sea. A seaweed laden area of the Atlantic bounded by four ocean currents. We are officially 900 nautical miles to the nearest land (a tiny island I’ve never heard of) and the sea below us is 80,000 feet deep. 80,000 feet. Over 15 miles down. The amount of water is impossible to imagine. Seriously, I’m trying.
The ocean goes so far into the horizon that the line where the sea meets the sky looks painted. I’m starting to understand how the Truman Show could convince Truman that he was outside in the real world. It’s so beautiful here I’m having trouble believing it’s real. I go back and forth between disbelief at the beauty and wonder that early explorers who didn’t know (for sure) there was an end to the water had the bravery to set sail into this.
I’m inspired and deliciously lazy all at the same time. (I don’t think I’ve ever been somewhere where I could actually say there is nothing I have to do right now.) I think I’ll go take another nap.
Writing Exercise:
I feel like a cat. I wake up, head over to my food bowl (buffet), then over to a lounge chair for a few hours. Then, digestion complete, I wander back to my room for a nap. I could handle being a cat forever. I thought I’d get bored, but apparently I’ve been short on sleep for…forever, and my body really really wants to catch up.
When I was a kid I used to beg my mother to let me stay up. I had soooo many important things to do as a five year old. I even promised that I’d sleep when I grew up. Sigh. But what if we could, or rather had to. What if the sleep debt we accumulate over time was being tabulated by something and we each had to plan for an enforced coma to make up what we owe. Would there be storage facilities to check ourselves into? Happy writing.
