I don't know about you, but I can just about get seasick standing in a puddle. Ironic since I grew up in a seafaring nation and my father is an avid sailor, so most summer holidays were spent sailing for weeks on end. I won't get into the details of how I handled that......!
Still, I love the ocean and I love sailing on a fine day. A fine day means no waves but enough wind for the sails to fill and the boat to move briskly, cleaving the gentle water with barely a jiggle. Much more than that, and I acquire a not so gentle shade of green. It's pathetic really - I also don't last long on a swing, a merry go round or any kind of amusement park ride other than roller coasters. Planes smaller than jumbo jets also present a problem, as did the gentle rocking of the high speed Eurostar train as it all but flew from Paris to London. So, just not much of a traveler for someone who loves to travel.
A few years ago I went for a ride on someone else's horse, a few hours from home. The horse and I had a misunderstanding about the best manner in which to tackle a certain jump and I fell and fell hard, bruising my lower back considerably. I soldiered on, climbed back in the saddle and finished the ride, even had some fun, but to my shock I could barely walk when I got off the horse, never mind getting into my truck. Finally I managed to fold myself up enough to clamber in and I drove home, tears of pain rolling down my face.
Not far from home a great big sign blinked by the freeway and caught my attention. It was a new sign I had never seen before, one of those digital screens that changes constantly. Just as I looked up it changed from advertising cars to saying this :
"Smooth seas do not a skilled sailor make."
I won't tell you the stream of curse words that flew from my lips, but I will tell you I also managed to laugh, if painfully. It stayed with me, all through a recovery that took several months and beyond, on into life going forward. I still think of it whenever I hit rough water and feel my stomach start to roil, when I get stressed out, when life does not go my way and I go a little green with anxiety.
It reminds me to hang tough, to cleave to my peaceful center, that while I am a sensitive, thin skinned individual with an easily upset stomach that should not hold me back from engaging in life and all it entails. That learning is why I am here, and maybe one thing I have had to learn is how to strike that balance when things get tough so I may soldier on, live and let live, learn and move on. Roll with the punches, not just fall apart and hang over the railing. That the unsettling times are not here to torture but to teach, and it's up to me to keep my eye on the horizon and my mind in the game.
So while I may never make much of a sailor, or a flyer, or a rider of amusement park rides, I do intend to make one heck of a life, regardless of what waves come my way.
