The Quiet in the Storm

Ah, Midwatch again, it was wet… <Sailors HATE the midwatch, really though, they hate anything that keeps them from the rack. Amen: so be it.> WARNING comments that are christian in nature and intent lie ahead! I have to smile and laugh though because earlier in the day/night I had prayed because of a foreboding that I had and in part of the prayer I said “My God answers me with a furious shout and a voice like thunder”. HA! Jokes on me. So I was awoken an hour before my watch to go and help fix the lines going from the sub to the barge, also the brow from the sub to the pier was off the damn boat so that had to be fixed as well. The voice that awoke me was a shipmate of mine shouting furiously about having to get up, la-de-da, I had to get up too. Though I did not do so peacefully… So after the situation/emergency was taken care of I had to relieve the watch. As soon as I stepped up to relieve the watchstander of his weapon the skies opened up and turned into a monsoon. In less than thirty seconds my boots were full of water, I felt like I had just jumped into a pool. Someone upstairs had just dropped a bucket on me(and everyone else, but I wasn’t thinking about them at the moment). So, After conducting the worlds fastest gun turn over, I assumed the watch. I stood topside in Horizontal rain watching a brow I couldn’t even see for four hours. At some point in this watch, while I was standing there the wind died down and the rain stopped and I remembered my prayer and I heard a voice… Laughing. God had indeed answered my prayer, and He did it just like I said He would, The bastard. The funniest thing was that in the whole rainstorm there was a lot of lightning but only on report of thunder. Thank you God for your faithfulness to answer my prayers, next time I’ll ask for candy bars and chocolates. 

Etch-a-Sketch; don’t give, don’t take, Accept.

To give is to receive; to be content is wrong; to be happy is good but not to be sought after, feelings are fleeting; seek what lasts, what will be forever; seek the truth in the moment; the face of the sun is ever changing. It’s dynamic and ending, a symbol of success, of perfection, of God, its dying. The moon is silently reflecting the tragedy of the sun, non-commental, non-judgemental; contemplating it’s own immanent demise. Uncaring of the sun’s blaze of glory, of the sun’s blindness, of it’s headlong flight towards darkness. The moon remains silent; say what you mean, don’t give voice to empty, useless chatter; breath is precious, do not give wisdom to the uncaring, to the heads of stone, do not speak in the presence of mockingbirds; keep your words, give when its right, when its time. Keep your ears open, your heart open, your soul tuned in; give all when all when all is required, do not flinch from greatness. Be who your father was, who your mother was, who Cesar was, who your heroes were; be who you are, do not apologize; let the light of the sun reflect  off of you, let it illuminate your weakness, your flaws; face what is wrong, face what is right, examine, re-examine; do not rest but be at peace. Work towards perfection, towards righteousness; know that you will never accomplish it.

 Is it right to reach for the unattainable? Is it good to spend your life on the unfathomable, to give to a black-hole? To study the untouchable? To strive for a finish line ever farther away?

I want off the wheel but I don’t want to leave the ground.

The words of a Poet are seen as entertainment.
The words of a Prophet are seen as philosophy.
The words of a Preacher are seen as rhetoric.
The words of a Teacher are seen as education.
The words of God are these.

Man speaks to Man, God speaks to Man, Man speaks to God. Spirit sees Spirit, communes with Spirit. God is spirit, Man is spirit.

Empty myself onto a page. The lines define my words, define where I place my feet, my pen, my eyes. The soul is poured as ink. My heart is opened on the page, closed on the face. The soul is poured as ink.

[these passages were first written by hand during my duty day on the boat, so this last passage is relevant to paper. I know the punctuation is… strange, but its meant to convey a sense of run-on continuity. Thank you all for stopping by, enjoy the dog house. (Etch-a-Sketch is a euphamism for my mind)]

A Question was pointed

During watch sailors will talk about everything. Mostly we gripe about the chain of command or tell stories of girls, real and imagined. Last night during watch we had a discussion of responsibility with one party saying that the majority of things that go wrong in a persons life are that persons fault. My response to this asinine comment was “Yeah, totally. Everything that happens to you is your fault.” At which point my companion said he was glad that I agreed with him. “You were conceived and born and that was your fault too. I don’t agree with you, I believe in the old saying ‘shit happens’.” Well that discussion sparked another. A question was asked, a hypothetical question. A flawed hypothetical, but most are. The question was a ‘what would you do?’ question. The situation was as follows: a man and his wife have just conceived, they go to the doctor to ascertain the eventual heath of the child. Doctor had horrible news: your child will not be healthy, in fact he will require lots of attention and care, all your attention will have to be given to this child. Ok, say the man and wife, but he will still be normal in the head right? Well there is a 50/50 chance that the child will have permanent brain damage. The good news is that its not to late to perform an abortion.

The question is then this: would you let the child live and deny yourself the freedom to have other children and more than likely end up in debt because of the cost of health care? Sure there is 50/50 chance that the child could grow to go to college and contribute something worth while like a cure for cancer, but if you have the abortion you give the opportunity to more children. Like I said the question is flawed to begin with, it is just a dig to see if you are pro-life or pro-choice. The way in which the question was posed to me it was obvious the ‘correct’ answer was pro-choice.

My answer: have the birth. My companion then tried to attribute my choice to religion. I disagreed, even though there is nothing wrong with someone making a choice based on faith, I did not wont to have that fruitless discussion with him. So I took a different tact: seeing as there is less than a fifty-fifty chance that any child will ever amount to anything special and seeing as you roll the dice with every new conception I see nothing wrong with keeping the child. Not only that there are charities and government programs out there that will hep with the raising of the child, also if a couple were to find that they didn’t have what it takes, the courage and will, to raise the child adoption is a viable alternative; child services will find some way to take care of the child’s basic needs. However lets say that this couple has what it takes. The question your asking me is whether or not I would make the decision based on faith or economics. Is it right or wrong (is it black or white? as if these things ever are) or will it cost too much or is there a greater reward for raising the child (i.e. a cure for cancer). So in reality your asking me the price of a human life. the answer then becomes obvious: far more than anyone/company/government/anything could ever pay, for every early death in this war, in this world, for every early death from car accidents or murder or ‘shit happens’ there is a deficit on the books of the universe; Gods cheque book is in the red.

“Officer! He pointed a loaded question at me with intent to pull the trigger, to drop the hammer!”
I hate pointless pointed questions.