Wintry Summer, James Blunt Sucks

6/8
Frustration. Not much time to write, trying to furl sail with kids on a daysail who couldn’t care less, small glories and victories on deck interspersed with a sailing brain fart (Coiling a line counterclockwise. Twice. Stupid. Ridiculous.), getting turned down for a second time by the same senior editor, both times with the basic caveat of, “I love it, the pub board voted it down despite my efforts, but keep sending in things of this caliber. Sorry.”
Frustration.
As the summer begins, so does my first professional winter. It is the first, and I am learning to handle it. It won’t be the last.
Chief Mate Shayma, and I were in the local New London area newspaper. A photographer took a picture of us while we were tuning the headrig.


Also funny, while at the Laundromat doing ship's laundry we found a Jehovah’s Witness’ tract with a picture of a man beating his wife, and the man looked uncannily like our fearless and domestically docile captain. If I had a scanner and a photo of Cap, you would be in on the joke. But for now, take my word for it, it’s funny. We all laughed a lot. Wish you could've been there and so on. Also, one of the ladies in the tract looked like Peggy Poteat, the head head of the English department at SNU, except in her picture she was in agony from being slaughtered by our loving Jehovah’s merciful angels. This particular tract followed the basic Bible tract formula: comic book + theological dogma – logic = inbred evangalism. I took it home.
On the car ride back from the Laundromat I reclined in the bags of clean laundry, reflecting on how frustrated I've been the past few days, though the cold beer and ice pressed up against my quickly numbing calf reminded me that it hasn't been that tough. I still have been learning a lot and improving as a sailor every day. Plus I have great crewmates and I get to see my Uncle Bert a lot. I just need to learn to adapt to the lack of routine, and make my own rhythm within the chaos.
At the risk of plagiarizing Donald Miller, I need to be like a good jazz musician, find the hidden melodies and harmonies, and play a song that was under the surface of the other elements. Jeez it sounds corny, but that’s what I was thinking on the car ride, and it brought me some peace of mind. Sometimes it pays to be corny. Just ask James Blunt. What a filthy wanker. Do not follow this link and read his song lyrics. You will be worse for it. Also, don’t go to his MySpace and listen to the song. Heaven may conveniently “lose” your file.
Ok, love to all, thanks for reading.