Big Yellow Moon

The ocean was calm and waiting the way oceans do when the wind begins sounding like a kid trying too hard to whistle. The stars were up there, everywhere. The stars and a huge yellow moon made me feel that empty-stomach sort of loneliness, and, inexplicably, as though I was being watched. An unusual perception, I would think, feeling looked at when you're alone at sea with no land nor another boat anywhere in sight. Perhaps it was just me watching me. Or maybe it was me watching me watching me. Then again, it could have just been the two yellow moons, the one in the sky and the one in the water beside me.


I realized I was feeling sorry for myself, which was something I couldn't allow and wouldn't allow, and I shook my head hard to rid myself of it and it worked. Whatever I was feeling changed into something else and became heart-felt laughter. I eventually did a silly dance on deck so that whatever was watching me could see I wasn't afraid, and I wasn't feeling sorry for myself any longer.

I began to sing a James Taylor song I couldn't quite remember; “There was a young cowboy, dhumm dhum dum-dhum..”

The waves soon grew stronger, and the boat rose and fell crashing against the growing chop and sway of a sea that was no longer waiting. Whatever watched me continued to watch me as I went forward to lower the main and lessen the foresail. When I came back to the cockpit, I was wet and happy, and looking forward to a great battle with the waves. I sang out above the wind to the stars and the moon and to the water that rose up green and crashed down across the deck leaving bleached white soap bubbles. I sang about cowboys, and women, and glasses of beer and for the rest of the night I was never alone.

291 Words