Love And Hate On Night Watch
By Katrina Hays
Originally published in Sea Stories Journal, Winter 2008

Offshore sailors have ridiculous and sublime ways to spend their time. One of these exercises in necessity and boredom is the night watch. I both adore and despise night watch. There is no middle ground here. Being awake and functioning at 0200 brings on feelings that are very strong, because by all rights I should be deeply asleep between 2200 and 0600. Very deeply asleep–dreaming soundlessly and re-charging my batteries. But a sailboat moving across wide oceans must be monitored day and night. Every crewmember takes a turn at the helm, watching over the fragile vessel that carries them over the deep. This is what I loathe and what I love about night watch:

I hate getting up.

My boyfriend Elliott is so much better about waking up for his watch. I gently touch his ankle and say his name and he jerks and says, “Hmmm?” He flips back the blanket, turns on the light, hops out of the berth and puts on his clothes. Done deal.

On the other hand… E gently touches my ankle and says my name and I resentfully groan and squeeze my eyes tight.

“No, no, no, no, no,” I moan.

“Time to get up, Katygirl”, he says, leaving to go put water on to boil for my tea.

I lie there. I don’t move. I try to open my eyes. I pull the awful polyester blanket tighter around my shoulders. When I finally shame myself into throwing the blanket back, I usually sit up too fast and crack my head against the overhead of the berth and collapse back on my side, cursing.

I slowly pull my sweater over my head. I scootch to the edge of the bunk, put my feet against the side of the boat and attempt to pull on my jeans. Sometimes I get stuck here. Elliott once came out of the head to find me–jeans pulled up to my knees but no further–collapsed over my braced legs. My eyes were shut, and I was fast asleep.

Finally dressed, I’ll use the head and brush my teeth. How can my mouth get so foul after just three hours of sleep? I stare groggily at my reflection in the mirror–the face is puffy and flushed, the hair is pulled out from the braid and hanging in wads around the face. Lovely.

 I stagger up to the galley and fumble for cup, tea bag, sugar, milk. I inevitably can’t find one of these things and snarl accusingly at E, who sweetly kisses my cheek on his way to sleep in my berth. I hate him too.

I struggle into my jacket, plaster a hat over my awful hair, look at the log, or try to, look at the computerized track of our progress. Or try to. Finally, I grab my mug of tea and go topside. Up to this point I am still really asleep. I waken completely with that first breath of salt-fresh air and a helm to watch.

I hate feeling sick.

Being inside a small boat moving across a large ocean at night can be extremely disorienting. The darkness, combined with the odd sideways swooping of a Norseman 43 catamaran sailing to windward can be exquisite torture for those of us with unreliable stomachs.

When the conditions are just right, the oncoming swell compresses between the two hulls of the boat and periodically slams against the bottom of the salon, resulting in an explosive bang that sends charts, unsecured mugs, and an unconcerned cat flying into the air. Along with the horrendous bang, I can hear the endless sound of the wind generator: a whistle that grows quickly to a shriek when the wind picks up.

The only light in the salon is an eerie glow from the computer screen, which adds to the general feeling of unreality. I feel like I’m in a weird haunted house that glows, shrieks, bangs, and slides sideways. Barf city.

Happily, merely going out into fresh air completely alleviates this feeling, and the helm is–thank heaven–outside.

I hate forgetting my teabag in my mug and having a lovely cuppa turn into a foul brew of too much bergamot that is so strong my teeth squeak together if I actually drink it.

I hate convincing myself that because I am bored I am also hungry. I try to persuade myself that a nice piece of fruit would be the best thing for me to eat. I envision one of those tart little tangerines in the fruit bin, just waiting for me. I hate failing at this every single time and having a handful, or two, or three, of chocolate chunk cookies.

I also love night watch.

I am, I confess, addicted to the sky at night. When I’m fortunate enough to have the heavens clear, I can easily spend my watch, head tilted back, staring at the stars. I have my favorites: Orion, marching across the fall and winter sky, the Pleiades who lead him, and Gemini, my birth constellation, following close behind. In the summer I love Cygnus, the swan, flying across the heavens with little Delphinius tagging along.

However, my Big Three, my constant and faithful friends, are Cassiopeia, the Big Dipper, and Polaris. These three were my earliest sky-friends, and now I think of them as a fine trio: Cass, Dip, and Pol. Cassiopeia and the Dipper engaged in an endless pavane, arms outstretched and dancing around Polaris.

I love my tea. I love the warmth of the mug in my hands; I love the perfect hot sweet milkiness of it in my mouth. I love the way it feels as it hits my sleepy stomach, and I love the way it has just enough caffeine to wake me up but still allow me to sleep three hours later.

I love sailing at night. I adore quietly slipping over the water like an exhaled breath, eating up the miles while the world turns in darkness under the boat’s hull. The magic of sailing is stronger at night. Swaddled in utter blackness, I become hyper-aware of the external signals of the wind and currents that push the boat along. In the midst of the wide ocean I have no exterior landmarks to visually tell me that our course is correct. Instead I look at the glowing computer and see proof that we are actually moving, mile after mile, towards those islands we want to reach, and I simply believe.

I love seeing and hailing other boats in the darkness. The mystery of their lights can keep you occupied for hours: Is that really a boat, or just a star on the horizon? Can I pick it up on the radar? Which way is it heading? What kind of boat is it? Are we going to run into it? There is endless entertainment to be had here.

I love watching the moon. I love the magic and majesty of her rising out of the ocean. I love her powerful light, fading and disappearing, then growing again to fat splendor over the course of the month.

Here’s what I love best of all about night watch: Somewhere around 0400, the night takes on a form and shape of its own. I slip into a zone where the darkness, the late hour, the shifts and lurch of the boat beneath me, and the sound and feel of the wind have all combined to lull me into a state of internal infinity. I am hypnotized by the night.

Suddenly, I notice the light. Just when I think that it cannot get any darker, just when I think that the darkness is all I will ever know, I am startled by the brightening of the eastern horizon. Startled–and immediately grateful.

The night watch abruptly shifts to a sunrise watch. I will stare and stare at the growing, glowing beautiful light. If we are sailing due east I have the sensation of being on a ball of rolling liquid, rushing toward the sun. The pulsing red shimmer that quickly springs into the air and becomes a new day is a miracle. Every time it is a miracle. I am reborn. The world is reborn. I breathe in my new day and feel myself expand into the beautiful seas around the boat.

And, at the very end of my night watch, I love the fact that I can go back to bed.

****

Liver Chestnut, Flaxen Mane and Tail, Two White Socks, and a Pretty Body

By Katrina Hays
Originally published in Verseweavers, Fall 2008

Terry had the uncanny ability
to pick open locked stall doors
and hunt out the grain bin.

She was a Morgan, and versatile:
jumping, dressage, Western pleasure,
trail horse, show horse–I even

learned to stand up on her butt
while she cantered gently in circles
on the lunge line.

I slept in her stall,
read books under her hooves;
caught two foals as they slid from her body.

I was, at that time, a puncher of animals.
A hitter, a kicker, a girl violent
with self-hatred.

Walking the summer pasture,
Terry trailing behind in a new blue halter,
thick lead rope heavy in my hands;

my mare–true to her piggish disposition–
stalled out, reached down,
yanked up a last mouthful of grass.

Thoughtless rage jerked her head up, swung
the bitter end of the rope hard
into her left eye.

She reared,
stood trembling and blinking,
my beautiful horse.

I reached out to her.
She bowed her neck,
accepted my soft traitor hand.

I would like to say
I never hit an animal again,
but I did and it took

years to walk out
of that pasture,
put down the rope.