At Sea

I fear I will have to leave science fiction until it is relevant again because it was weeks ago and I have forgotten what I meant to say.

I have just started reading Cloud Atlas. My sister found the movie previews interesting and researched it. Once she found out it was a book she decided to read it before the movie and SURPRISE, it is also on The List. After finishing it herself she handed it over to me, continuously asking how far I've gotten.

The first chapter is the journal of a man sailing in the south Pacific/New Zealand area in what seems to be the turn of the last century. I have to confess that I love books about being at sea and sailing. I like the idea of seeing water from one horizon to the next. Though I doubt I would be very seaworthy it is a secret dream of mine to live on a boat for at least six months.

Some of the books I've read that have increased my longing for the sea:

Sailing Alone around the World by Joshua Slocum
Troubling a Star by Madeleine L'Engle
The Voyage Out by Virginia Woolf
Life of Pi by Yann Martel (though not the ideal situation)
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis
Odyssey by Homer

There is something about the unknowns of the ocean that make it majestic. For many of the books/characters it is a liminal place outside of normal society and a betwixt one stage of life and another. Some people find themselves at sea and others loose themselves.

I have a fascination with its vastness, with seeing nothing but the horizon. The great lakes can hold a similar feeling and it was often more calming to stare out across Lake Michigan than any other activity when living in the windy city. I think I have been spoiled by the vast Texas sky and can't help but look for that vastness in other places. Another reason I like travel by sea tales is the guidance of the stars. To be so far away from shore and see every possible star to the naked eye from one horizon to the opposite. That is something I wish to see.

It kind of amazes me that many minds do not wander so far and most books stay on level land. That is probably because of the liminality factor, though maybe I am just not looking in the right places.
I was quite jealous of a blogger I read, Joy the Baker, when she described a trip on a oyster dredging schooner in Maine. Its at least good to know that kind of thing exists.

Current Reading:
On List: Cloud Atlas by David Michell
Walden, or Life in the Woods by Henry David Thoreau

Off: The Origins of the Modern World by Robert B. Marks

On hold: 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami
Manners and Mischief Edited by Laura Miller
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert