"Safe Harbor"
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There were just eight of us on the sailboat
along with the captain. We were having a wonderful voyage. None of us had met
before the trip but we seemed to be getting along just fine. By day, the ocean
was a brilliant turquoise and by night, the sky was awash in all the stars of
the Milky Way. We had been blessed with clear weather and a gentle breeze for
the entire week so far. The feeling of being happily lost on the endless ocean
was delicious, even though we assumed the captain had been plotting our course
all along.
All of us had answered an ad in a travel magazine for singles, so none of us was
shy. Every night we'd sit on the deck under the vast canopy of stars. Moments
like that, when the splendor of the universe was arrayed all around us, were
conducive to talking about deep, heady things. I didn't usually say much but I
liked to listen and encourage the others. That was just my way.
Ruby was a woman who had a strong belief in the power of crystals. She had quite
a collection of them and even kept one in her shirt pocket, close to her heart.
She said that it would protect her from bad karma and help her to live a
healthier, longer life. She even gave a crystal to me on the first night,
holding it out to me as if it were part of the Crown Jewels. I took it and
smiled, examining it and nodding, even though I didn't believe in crystals. The
last thing I wanted to do was to be negative toward a new friend.
Carlos was a man would meditate every evening on one of the deck chairs,
chanting a phrase over and over. When he finished, he joined the rest of us. I
once asked him if meditation made him feel better. He nodded his head and
offered to teach me but I told him maybe some other time. I didn't want to hurt
his feelings by telling him that the whole idea of trancelike meditation made me
a little nervous.
Emily was an older woman who read tarot cards by the light of the ship's
lantern. We all laughed at some of the things she told us about ourselves and
some of her guesses seemed to be pretty close to the mark. I let her read my
fortune one night and although it was full of generalities and half-truths, I
pretended to be amazed. I didn't want to spoil the fun. And besides, she seemed
to think it was more than a game, and who was I to question her beliefs?
I was very popular on that voyage. Everyone seemed to really like me because I
knew how to fit right in. I had my own beliefs, of course, but in my mind it
would have sounded like preaching to tell the others. No one likes preaching. I
was sure the others had heard my beliefs a thousand times before anyhow and they
wouldn't have been interested. The important thing was to try not to shove
anything down anybody's throat.
On the third night we all stayed up until 5 AM. By then we had gotten really
comfortable with each other. We did a lot of talking that night, and even some
off-key singing. As things finally broke up and we stood to make our bleary-eyed
way to our bunks, I glanced off to the east. The sky was already lightening and
I saw a dark sliver on the edge of the horizon. It looked like an island.
***
It's hard to know exactly what happened next. I
went to bed of course, just like everyone else, and fell instantly to sleep. But
how we all ended up in the water, floundering around like drowning puppies, I'll
never know. All I remember is waking to the sounds of shouting, of running feet
on the deck above, of someone banging on my cabin door. I heard the terrible
words, "We're sinking!"
I jumped out of bed and ran up to the deck in panic. The boat tilted at a
nauseating angle and as I stood there gaping it felt like I was in a fun-house,
the kind where the floors heave up and down. Soon the angle got too steep for me
to stand, and although I reached out to hang onto the mast, my hand slipped and
I slid into the water.
None of us had had time to prepare for something like this. One moment we were
all sleeping and the next we were in the water. I watched the top of the mast
slide beneath the waves and we were alone in the eerie quiet of the open ocean.
I grabbed at a wooden chest that was floating by. I climbed on top of it,
hanging on for dear life. I looked around. Others had grabbed onto bits of
Styrofoam coolers, to pieces of wood planking, to anything that would float. I
counted heads. There were only eight of us. The captain was gone.
We padded toward each other and grabbed hands so we could stay together. We
bombarded each other with questions. Did anyone know what had happened? Why did
the ship sink? Did the captain go down with the ship? But none of us knew a
thing.
"What should we do?" someone asked.
"Maybe we should stay together," said someone else. "The captain might have
sent out a distress signal before we went down."
"I don't think so,"
said another. "If he had been able to do that, he would have made it off the
boat like the rest of us. We need to figure out which way to go. There must be
an island around here someplace."
"But which way?" asked someone else.
We were having trouble staying together because the waves kept trying to move us
apart. I sputtered and tasted harsh salt-water. Others coughed.
"Hold onto my arm," said Ruby to the person next to her. With her other hand she
produced a crystal from her shirt pocket. The rising sun caught its surface and
turned it into a shining rainbow, making it seem like a magical omen of great
power. She squeezed the stone in her palm and closed her eyes. "I can feel the
vibrations," she said. "The crystal is telling us there is an island to the
north."
I gritted my teeth as I hung onto the wooden chest. North? I was pretty sure I
had seen an island to the east, late last night when we were all going to bed.
At least I was pretty sure. But I didn't speak up. The woman was so sure of her
belief in crystals, and besides, I might have been mistaken.
"Not north," said Emily, the tarot card woman. "We need to go west." She seemed
to have gone into some sort of psychic trance. She took a deep, spooky breath
and pointed to the west with her long finger. I looked that way and saw only
waves. I looked toward the east, where the sun was just rising out of the ocean.
I couldn't see any sign of land. Maybe I was too low in the water. Or maybe
there wasn't any land to see that way at all.
"South," said Carlos, the man who knew how to meditate. "The universe is
directing us to the south. I can see a flaming arrow in the water." We all
looked that way. I saw only more waves.
My mind was a jumble. Should I tell the others what I had seen? Each of the
three who had spoken up was convinced they were right. If I gave my opinion then
I would be saying they were wrong. Who was I to judge their beliefs? So I kept
quiet.
"Well, it's clear to me what we should do," said a fourth person, a lawyer named
Michelle. "Each of us should follow the person we think has the right answer."
We all nodded our heads. This seemed very reasonable. We all had a free choice,
after all. Choice was the important thing. We would each decide for ourselves.
We let go of each others hands and began to drift apart. Michelle the lawyer
followed Ruby and her crystal. Two others followed Carlos and his meditation.
Another followed Emily and her tarot cards. That left me. The others looked back
as they bobbed in the waves.
"What about you?" shouted Michelle.
"I'll go toward the sun," I yelled back. I couldn't stop thinking about that
smudge I had seen on the horizon. To the east. The others smiled and wished me
luck. We all felt proud of ourselves for being so enlightened, for letting each
other make up our own minds.
Everyone drifted out of sight and I was all alone. I turned toward the east and
began paddling. All I saw ahead of me was endless ocean and I felt incredibly
small. I began to get thirsty.
After an hour a wave lifted me high and I thought I saw a gray smudge on the
horizon. After ten more minutes of paddling another wave lifted me. The smudge
had grown larger and I knew it was an island. I cheered and paddled harder.
Suddenly I thought of the others. I spun around, trying to see if any of them
were still in view. But I saw no one. I shouted at the top of my lungs, but all
I heard in response was the sound of the rolling waves. I shook my head and went
back to my paddling. They had made their choice and I had made mine.
Near sundown, I finally reached the shore of a beautiful island. The breeze had
died down and gentle waves eased me onto a sandy shore. There was a man there,
standing in front of a blazing fire. He wore a simple, white robe and sandals.
As I climbed unsteadily to my feet the man smiled and held out his arms.
"Welcome," he said. "You must be hungry."
I gratefully wolfed down the piece of fish he offered me, along with some bread
that he had broken off from a fresh loaf. I took several swallows from his flask
of wine and sat down on the sand, feeling clean and refreshed. I noticed that my
clothes were suddenly, inexplicably dry, and the warmth from the fire felt
heavenly. I started to ask the man where we were, what island this was, but he
walked away from me. He stopped at the water's edge and stood looking out to
sea. The sun splashed below the western horizon. Soon it was dark and stars
filled the sky.
"What are you looking for?" I called.
"The others," he answered.
"Others?"
"Yes, there were seven more with you in the water."
My breath caught in my throat. How could he have known that? The man came over
and looked into my eyes. His own eyes danced in the firelight.
"Well," I stammered. "They went different ways - each of them. It was their
choice."
"Yes, it was," he said. "So why did you come this way?"
"I saw land to the east, a few hours before the ship went down."
"So you knew the right way to go," he said. He didn't sound angry or accusing.
So why did I feel so uneasy?
"Well...I guess so," I managed to say. "But I didn't want to judge them. They
were all so sure they were right."
"But you knew the way," he said again.
I looked out at the inky blackness of the ocean. I thought of what it would feel
like to be out there still, bobbing in the dark. I considered going back out,
swimming all night, somehow, improbably finding the others and bringing them
back here.
"It's too late," the man said.
"What?"
"It's too late to save them. They're gone."
I knew in my heart that he was right. I watched the gentle waves lap the sand
and felt tears well up in my eyes.
The man put his hand on my shoulder. I looked up and his smile was warm. "I'm so
glad you're here," he said. "You need to rest now. You've had a very long day."
He led me to a soft spot on the beach where he had prepared a bed for me. I lay
down on my back and looked up at the glittering stars. It was a long, long time
before I was able to sleep.
END