Sunrise, Sunset
The essence of my work is to wait. All day long I stand looking at the sea waiting for whales, waiting for dolphins, waiting for sea turtles. My job does not compel me to go looking for mammals and sea turtles. So I bide my time. I wait. I watch. I look at the ocean. I have no agenda other than to be there—to attend the sea.
People often say “But Jamie,” or if they have mommentarily forgotten my name because they are selfish and drunk with the sound of their own voice, “But Dude,” then they get a crazy look in their eyes while they try to imagine what they are asking. “What do you, like, do all day on a boat.” Not everybody uses the word “like.” I do have friends that aren’t morons.
Well friend, perhaps you have asked me this very question, or wondered it, or more likely you don’t care and arrived at this website after Googling the words “Budweiser+fun+kill+chickens” which is how I get most of my traffic, since I rarely update. (In the future I will post about the people who were upset about my “This is Budweiser; This Is Beer” post. I digress. But let us just say these people didn’t just leave comments, they E-mailed me about my “un-American” disregard for Budweiser and the commercial that promotes it.) Well a good part of my day is spent doing absolutely nothing but looking in the direction of the ocean.
All my life I have been waiting. When I was in my twenties I remember whole nights passing with me alone looking out my window and at my window at myself. Sometimes, before I had learned how to distract myself, the heaviness of life was too much for sleep. Sometimes, before I had learned not to notice, time was trickling too fast between the fingers of my carefully cupped hands. So I stayed awake. I attended these spilt seconds, minutes, and hours preciously. While watching the old window fan spin in place I wondered where all that time went, and more important, where was all that time was going.
Out here on the boat, time sometimes stands still. I am waiting to get off this boat and resume my life. This is nothing like life–bobbing up and down looking at the sea. It’s a living, but it’s not my life. So to pass the time–that time I once held so close–I revel in things that I don’t always notice in other settings.
It is true about my absurd occupation, that there isn’t much to see. But every day, twice a day, the sun puts on a show using only itself, the clouds, and the sea. Every day the cloth drops off the largest canvas in the world, and I attend the show with camera in hand. I’m not always alone. On some boats the sunset is a call to worship. A few crew members, usually the older ones, file out to the deck after dinner or before dinner. Cigarettes are carefully lit. Coffee is quietly savored. On these days when two or more are gathered together to watch the sun, not much is said. What can a person add to a sunset? There is a certain solemnity to these proceedings. I sometimes feel I should take of my hat and put it over my heart until the sun is gone. I barely breathe. And I wait.
