Japanse New-Girl Monkey Network
Terra Australis Incognita
i live by the ocean
and during the night
i dive into it
down to the bottom
underneath all currents
and drop my anchorand this is where i'm staying
this is my home
- Bjork, The Anchor Song
Sometimes it doesn't even take a person as superstitious as myself to feel like something is meant to happen. I got up the morning after Christmas, expecting to show up at SeaTac with the hopes that I could fly standby to San Francisco, where I had a confirmed flight to Sydney. Instead, the travel agent informed me that there was an available seat, and booked me for a 7:30 flight to SFX. My parents and I drove leisurely down to the airport, arriving well in advance, worried they might want to search my boatload of luggage, which included a giant plastic container just a half a pound under the weight limit full of junk I couldn't live without.
At the airport, I got a new story-- all the flights to San Fran were running late, and I'd likely miss my connection, so they booked me for a flight to LAX instead, that left slightly earlier, and then re-routed me to Sydney from there. It wasn't until I started to board the plane that I realized they'd given me a first class seat.
So I settled into my seat, enjoying the immediate beverage service and already on a first name basis with the stewardess. This is a good sign, I thought.
Ensconced safely on my flight to Sydney (after the 800 mile hike to a different gate in LAX-- that airport is bigger than Bellingham, I think), with the freedom of an empty seat next to me (another good sign), I cracked open one of my Christmas presents from my Dad, Blue Lattitudes, about the voyages of Captain Cook and the romance of sailing the Pacific.
I flew some 8000 miles in a matter of hours over legs that took Cook, in his various voyages, years to traverse, navigate and chart, in small and often leaky wooden boats, with limited supplies, the threat of disease, and unknown and sometimes hostile cultures. And despite all the destruction, cultural contamination, and syphillis Cook and his crew left in his wake, it is true that his were the first steps toward a truly global awareness.
Today I swam on the opposite side of the Pacific from where I was conceived, born, grew up. The waves curled and crashed just as they did off the coast of California. The salt stung my nose just the same as I remembered when I dived under the waves. The sun glinted off the water. I can't change the past damage that came about from Cook's travels, and I certainly don't celebrate it. But I do celebrate being here, now, drawn by the excitement of the South Pacific that Cook's discoveries created.
{ link me }