the things I do for stories

[kaigou]

I'm not dead, just been focused on a major project (went live yesterday, whee), and in the meantime, realized that I couldn't exactly frame an argument between characters over the best (oceanic) route to take if I didn't actually know the timeframes it'd take to get from one place to another. And then I realized that I didn't even know if the between-island route I'd drawn was even possible. I mean, there's the straits of Bosporus (the inspiration for the route) but it's also an insane strait with a 90' turn in the middle, and I'm writing the age of sail.

I ended up calling my best friend's husband, who's been sailing since he was only yay-tall, did time in the navy, and went on to do lots with tall-masted ships. I'd been trying to research ships, but most of the stuff out there seems to assume you already have a clue. (Shrouds? stays? sheeves? euphroes? what the hell?) That was an hour's chat on Sunday and my head is still reeling.

Not the least of which is getting over the not-so-mild terror at the sheer thought of ever being on a freaking flight control of an aircraft carrier -- not exactly at water-line, here -- and having waves so big they're crashing INTO the flight control windows. HELLO.

As if that wasn't enough, he then described going through Hell Gate (a stretch before Long Island Sound where two rivers and the ocean and a few other rivers all meet in one place and you end up with eddies, whirlpools, horrible mixed-up currents and let's not forget the submerged rocks). I had unintentionally mapped out basically a mix pretty much identical to Hell Gate's setup, but I've also been through a similar one, too, in Sydney. The conflux of ocean tides and the multiple river-mouths in Sydney harbor create a wacky spot in the middle where all the currents meet, and even the massive Staten-Island-sized ferry we were on got tossed about like a cork. The ship had several minutes of serious rapid tilt (about 45' in one direction, and then 45' in the opposite direction and then back again in a heartbeat). K commented that if you're ever going to get seasick, you'll definitely do it going through Hell Gate or similar. Since I didn't even feel queasy on that ferry, I felt a little better about it, but I won't lie and say I wasn't absolutely petrified all the same.

I don't know why I keep ending up writing about sailors, when the very notion of being over water where I can't see the bottom puts a fear greater into me than just about anything else I can name.

Comments

[soukup]

the very notion of being over water where I can't see the bottom puts a fear greater into me than just about anything else I can name.

This fear always fascinates me. If you don't mind my asking, do you think it's more about a fear of things that might be in the water (sharks, eels, sea monsters, slimy seaweeds, etc), or simply about the depth itself (ie, a feeling of being very tiny in the face of a staggeringly huge abyss)?

[kaigou]

Stuff in the water doesn't actually frighten me too much. I wouldn't say I'd throw myself into the path of a shark (or even a jellyfish, having experienced the latter first-hand), but it's not a mindless terror. I think the fear of deep water is kind of a merging of two things -- the fear of falling (heights give me slight vertigo and make me feel uneasy but in general don't send me into panic) and the fear of the dark. Down where you can't see the bottom, the water gets very dark, and that scares the absolute bejabbers out of me. So it's not really the notion of being small, which is just disconcerting (since I'm smaller than the world even on land, really), nor of what's in there. It's just the simple fact of not being able to see and knowing it's so far down, potentially so far down and dark the entire way. Yikes. Gives me the heebie-jeebies just writing about it!

Hell, when I lived on the east coast in a region where you had to cross bridges to get anywhere, there were some bridges that could send me into a sheer blind panic. The Throggs-Neck bridge, the bridge to Newport over the Narragansett, the Delaware Memorial bridge, and one of the bridges in Boston, can't recall now which one. Until the night I was driving a 17' rental truck with all my stuff, and two dogs in the front cab with me, and the crosswinds on the Delaware Memorial had a warning sign of being 45mph. There wasn't a place to stop and I was already running late, so I crossed, and changed lanes several times without even moving the steering wheel, the wind was that fierce. I'm pretty sure I started to scream at one point, until the elder dog barked at me.

Then I realized that if I lost it, they'd bear the burden, too. Since then I've sometimes been a little uneasy on bridges, but never again terrified to that point... It didn't really end the terror, mind you. More like Odetta's total lack of distress about my sheer amount of distress got me to the point of realizing I could focus and just power right through it, and I'd survive. It's not pleasant, but it's survivable.

I guess having dogs who won't put up with hysterics can sometimes be a good thing. Heh.

[soukup]

It's just the simple fact of not being able to see and knowing it's so far down, potentially so far down and dark the entire way. Yikes.

*nods* Yes, I think I hear you on that. Also, I'm very glad you survived that trip! That would have been a nightmare for me, as motor vehicles are my personal Achilles' heel. Thanks for explaining your brain!