The Seaman and the Moon

mundane magic, poetry, inspiration

~I sat in a three hour ferry line after supporting a client on a psychedelic journey in her home. It took me 2 hours to get to her that morning. A total of 7 hours of travel with driving. All due to a boat being down. I don’t usually make house calls across the water, except for when I do. There has to be a strong calling in me to make exceptions. And I get paid.

We finally boarded and my car was guided to the bottom left hand side of the ferry boat, tucked up next to the water. The sun had just set and the half moon was a hand’s width above the horizon casting a golden trail of light upon the sea.

I have been navigating some mobility issues and so I did not ascend to the upper decks as usual. Instead, headphones in, I poured my stiff body into the open space next to my car and moved in a rhythmic wave.

I always dance on the ferry. It is a fascinating study to feel people’s reactions to a woman freely moving her body in public. Most of them want to look, but don’t want to invade my privacy even though I am in a public space. Many women glance, get uncomfortable and all tangled up inside where the “how dare she” meets the “I wish I could” and the “how beautiful”. Men look for all the reasons men look at women, and then look away because men aren’t supposed to look at any other woman other than their partners. If I was a rose in bloom it wouldn’t be an issue, but I am a woman. My body, the female body, is the main terrain in nature where beauty has been most adulterated.

My body swayed gently as the boat rolled through the waves, my breath full of moon light. I was at peace, the three hour wait a distant memory. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed that the man in the truck behind me was standing at the rail over the water staring at the moon in stillness, with a barely detectable awareness of my presence, yet I could feel him wondering.

As the ferry ride came to an end and I took out my headphones to get back in my car, the man approached me. He was about mid 60s, weathered and dressed like Willy Nelson in his latter years. I could tell he was nervous.

“Was that Qi Gong you were doing? It was so graceful.”

Oh to feel what lives in the space between a man and woman, an older man and attractive younger woman, between two strangers in bodies with stories- many the same.

“How can I approach her without her feeling invaded? How can I talk to her without ‘hitting’ on her? I don’t see a ring. She sure is attractive. Would I be approaching her if she wasn’t? (and what is considered attractive and why) Why can’t a man and a woman just talk?”

“He is nervous. I can tell he wants to engage but doesn’t know how. What does he want with me? He seems genuine. Has he been envisioning having sex with me? I’m so tired of protecting myself against men. How can I say No without creating a sense of rejection? How can I say yes without signing up for anything beyond a chat? Why can’t a man and a woman just talk?

Rather than collapse into defensiveness or assumptions, I took a breath and looked him in the eye. I do not want to feed what separates men and women. How can I stay alert to what lives in the field in a way that creates healing boundaries that enliven our sovereignty? If this were Ireland there would be almost no hesitation, no need for all of these inner negotiations. We would be swapping stories faster than a seaman reads the winds. (not to fetishize the Irish people but it’s mostly true).

So this man and I began to chat. He said he was drawn to Chi Gong at this stage in his life. I don’t know if that was true. I asked about the fresh, plastic wrapped tattoo I noticed on his right arm. It was a sailor’s knot. He was marking his 40th year at sea and 12 years as captain. This is when the energy shifted and his eyes sparkled like that light, that only graces those who know The Deep, that lives at the bottom of the Ocean.

I could feel what happens to a man’s soul when it has been shaped by wind and water. The expansion from courting the unknown as a job. The connection to his environment, the required longing. And the danger that the longing and drifting beget. The drugs, the lostness, the hard edges, the castaway and the stray. A nuanced soul, a textured man.

I would rather sit amongst unshaven men with a few whiskies on their breath and an ocean of stories swishing in their bones, then the groomed man whose life stories are only equal to, and as interesting as, the sum of his possessions.

(a poem I wrote months ago)

He mentioned he wanted to feel more connected to his surroundings and I laughed. He was startled. “I just witnessed you in a 30 minute communion with the moon”. He smiled.

It seems to me that a seaworthy man is a man who is intimately connected with the movement of Life force. In its own way, that is a whole lotta Qi Gong.

The moon and the waters are reflective images that help us know that we too radiate light. However, the reflection from others can also light up a part of us that we aren’t able to see, often more powerfully. Which is why positive associations that align with our soul, and not our shame, are important and yet deeply challenging when our self worth is low. We gravitate towards what we believe about ourselves.

A shared human shadow is that we don’t see ourselves clearly. And when our primary mirrors are images and ideologies that promote rejection and isolation, competition and comparison then we can develop very skewed views of who we are, how we show up and the light we naturally radiate. All which breeds shame, unworthiness and continued separation from our shared human flaws and human glories- from belonging.

He mentioned how rare my openness is and how hard it is to watch everyone so protected and shut down into themselves and bent over their phones. “No one connects anymore, everyone is threatened by everyone else’s presence.” I sighed.

“People are so overwrought with stress that they fear you will need something from them when there is little to give. But hey! we are changing that right now.”

He gave me his card with this quote:

“The good Seaman weathers the storm he cannot avoid and avoids the storm he cannot weather”

I am tempted to email him and share some stories. But, like many of us, my time is spread out to all the things I love and it still doesn’t feel like enough. And that is not why we met. So, this is my deep thank you to him. He made a move on a dancing woman under the moon that has now blossomed into this story for you. ;)

When we are awake to every moment of life, the is-ness of simply being and that everything, even a 3 hour ferry boat line, is in perfect order, we stay open to miracles. This little interaction lifted me, put a pep in his step, created an elevated vibration that rippled through the waters below us to some distance shore for some unknown human, who is just another face of me, needing to be seen by the light.

The Seaman and the Moon…

Your life is guided by the curves of Moonlight,

your ship steered by the sway of her shapes

You have weathered the smack of the Whale’s tail

when you forgot that it’s the song in your heart

that helps Life turn the tides

The tales you keep can reignite Oceans of wonder

in the many children lost in the sea of these times

A good storm is the security blanket

that has wrapped your soul in faith

that the thousand shades of blue are always there in the end

Because your map home is scribed in the ever shifting wind

you are who I want to call my mate

when we are all asked to begin again.

~ Blessed Be, Shira Starfire.

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