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June 21, 1999
Hawaii to Tarawa Voyage, Update #49
Day 49. Monday 21 June 1999 0355 GMT
Wind E-ENE 4. Heading 180M.
Latitude: 04deg 22.290N
Longitude: 178deg 42.184W
No change in sea state. A helpful steady breeze is coming in from the east, not enough to make serious miles on the chart, but sufficient to improve our progress from yesterday. The rogue current pushing us north seems to have slackened, and strangely the counter-current running back east has increased - good news as it allows us to continue chipping south without westerly drift.
It's been 7 weeks now. God what a long time 7 weeks on the ocean is. I suppose the reality that I am experiencing is just a projection of my state of mind, and so the experiential quality of this reality is ultimately in my hands to create and to witness and not judge. But the truth is I am slowly but surely sinking deeper and deeper into the abyss of isolation which closes around me like a giant wad of chloroform; dulling my senses, petrifying my brain cells, mummifying my being. Nothing has changed for weeks now. I do the same thing, the same way, every day (Ever see Bill Murray in the film 'Groundhog Day'?). I have a refined routine for everything that ensures maximum conservation of energy and efficiency of 'getting the job done' of pedaling this boat from Hawaii to Tarawa. But a part of me is dying - the part that generates freshness and enthusiasm for all this. I fear the creeping gray funk has the upper hand at the moment.
At times in the past few days a sensation of rising panic and hopelessness wells up from nowhere. I mercilessly beat down these insurgent feelings with a big stick. But they're still there, always there - lurking in the wings ready to sneak onto stage when I'm feeling vulnerable. It helps knowing there is only one door out of this joint - and its this concrete fact that forms the bedrock of keeping going. A guy from a radio station in Canada asked me a week or so ago, "Do you ever feel like giving up?" The answer is the decision is thankfully out of my hands. I have to keep going or else I just sit here until the food runs out. The wall is there - I can feel it - but I also know it is a fabrication of mind. It's all mind, all of this - the boat, the ocean, the voyage, the suffering, the hopelessness. There is no real wall - its an illusion. I create all this baggage and then react to it. Humanness: just lose it - get over it - transcend it Lewis. But it's so hard. So damn hard.
Writing this helps - thanks for bearing with me.
Jason Lewis,
The Moksha motor
Posted on June 21, 1999 2:06 AM