I am sitting by our bedroom window looking out at twilight after the setting sun. I have taken a couple of photographs, but they do not capture the reality. They are too insipid. I tried to edit the images but could not come close enough to do justice to what I see. Even more than half blind my vision is better than my iPhone and iPad can capture. We are evolutionary miracles. So you are going to have to take my word that I am glancing up and seeing vivid beauty.
Let’s go back almost thirty years. A few weeks after I sank RESURGAM I am in Littleton, New Hampshire, staying with friends as I slowly began to heal. One Sunday we go out to brunch and are talking about a magazine article in which a man claims expertise about sailing with Webb Chiles. He was in fact the yacht salesman who arranged the deal in which I traded my Ericson 35 for the Ericson 37 in which I made my first circumnavigation. He ‘sailed’ with me upon delivery for less than an hour. I related this to my friends and said, “I don’t sail with anyone I don’t sleep with.” Upon which an attractive younger woman at the next table said, “I’ll sail with you,” and gave me her business card. I thought: If she has any sense of logic that is a pretty good offer. I am not going to go into detail as to what else happened between us except to say that her sense of logic was sound.
Fortunately for some I have mellowed with advancing years. I hesitate. I am not sure I have mellowed. Maybe having done far more and having lived far longer than I ever thought I would, I have become more…again I hesitate. More what? I don’t know. I do know to the relief of a few that it is no longer necessary to sleep with me to sail, briefly, with me, and in the past week I have gone for day sails with friends twice. Tim and Cheryl several days ago and Michael yesterday. That this happened twice in a week is rare. In the ten years that I have owned GANNET only twice before have I sailed on GANNET with anyone other than Carol, with whom it is no secret that I do indeed sleep with.
Both of the recent sails were pleasant. Michael wrote of our sail on his site including photos I did not know he took. Doing so while he was at the helm is impressive.
https://conchscooter.blogspot.com/2021/11/driving-webb-chiles.html
There is no conclusion here. What is next? Webb Chiles party animal? I think not. I have called myself a much married monk, so I can also be a sometimes social monk. But monk I am.
Trending now on Netflix is a 1977 West German documentary HITLER A CAREER.
I know the history. I have read a good many books on Hitler who was by many accepted standards a great success story, but I found this film interesting. The narration is extremely well written and spoken and there is much archival footage that I had not seen before.
Why it is trending now I do not know, but if you have Netflix it is well worth your time.
In today’s entries in THE ASSASSINS CLOAK is one from Noel Coward from 1961 in which he is considering those of his friends and relatives who have died as he has grown older.
Those of you who have watched my two ‘End of Being’ videos will know that I too expect oblivion.
In them I state that I do not fear oblivion, but I do have some apprehension about the probable pain in the process. I have thought about that. I do have such apprehension about that probable pain, but I have greater apprehension about becoming infirm and incapable and dependent before my death. Webb Chiles in a nursing home? The horror.
Today in the ANCHOR BOOK OF CHINESE POETRY I read a section of anonymous erotic poems dating from about 1600.
I could not get the Nun on a page by herself, so disregard the other fragments.
And finally from Fred comes a link to music by Brenno Blauth, a Brazilian composer of whom I had not known, I thank him. It is interesting that he heard it at Port Townsend, a place I have not visited, but know is welcoming of sailors, some of whom do more than sail. Perhaps you will enjoy it as much as I do.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1ybPu7LteA
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