Hilton Head Island: treading water; open and shut

        I have not posted this week because Carol is here and we are having daily meetings with the contractor, inspectors, condo committee members.  All those aspects of normal modern life that I have avoided for  forty years and make me long for the purity and simplicity of the open ocean.

        Joel happened a few days ago to send me a relevant quote from the Fitsgerald translation of THE ODYSSEY.  I thank him.

Only Odysseus time and again turned craning towards the sun, impatient for day's end, for the open sea. Just as a farmer's hunger grows, behind the bolted plow and share, all day afield, drawn by his team of wine dark oxen: sundown is a blessing for him, sending him homeward stiff in the knees from weariness, to dine; just so, the light on the sea rim gladdened Odysseus

       
        The condo is nearly gutted.  No longer a refrigerator for yoghurt, ice and cold martinis.  Or frozen Lean Cuisines, which doesn’t matter because there is no longer a micro wave either.

        About all that is left is the guest bathroom, electricity, the Internet and air conditioning. 

        Due to dreary complications no work is presently being done. 

        I’m on the screened porch.  We do still have the view.

————

        Praise for the South African sailor who has long claimed an open boat circumnavigation appeared at the Sailing Anarchy site.

        This specious claim has been made far too long.

        I did not correct it earlier because I did not want it to appear that I was protecting my own open boat voyage, but now that Yvon Bourgnon has made an open boat circumnavigation that is no longer an issue and I sent an email linking to my journal post last year about the South African boat, which Sailing Anarchy calls ‘an open and shut case.’

        You can find all this here.

        Scroll down to ‘Open Sore’ and ‘Biggie Small’.