Letters | Writing | Love | Romance | Harry Hogg
Is Love a Vegetable?
I think it can be, but which one, that is the question.
As the winds of life have shifted and time has taken its toll, I veer away from my cherished sailing days, seeking instead the comfort and ease of owning a motor yacht in my later years.
Ageing has taught me the value of adapting to new challenges, and the motor yacht suits my needs perfectly.
This transition got me pondering the parallels between life-long sailing and life-long relationships. Both journeys require navigating through rough times, challenges, exploring uncharted territories, and facing the uncertainties ahead, whether on the open waters or within the intricate realm of human emotions.
Sailing requires adaptability to changing winds and tides, just like relationships demand flexibility and compromise to weather the ups and downs. Moreover, both endeavors offer opportunities for growth, learning, and developing a deep sense of trust and connection with the elements or your partner.
However, in my case, they differed significantly, as sailing was always a solitary adventure, a therapy, while a long relationship involves shared experiences, intimacy, and the profound emotional bond between two individuals on the same journey.
When I decided I would write something on this subject, getting me away from other more tedious writing, I started to think about all those times I’ve sailed into stormy conditions. Trust me, I was never reckless about storms, always treating them with respect.
Then I thought about the way I travel through love, how it feels, how it hurts, and how I could never live so happily without having love in my life.
But there are storms.
During all the years I experienced sailing the seas, I never felt a wave as gigantic as the wave that swept over me when I met Jenny. I was most definitely not prepared for such a storm of feelings.
I’d been a man sometimes fighting for his life, except each wave that crashed over me back then was alcohol laced, submerging me into depths of guilt on what I had not done for my family, those mere promises made, dreams left on shores, and uncharted waters that would never be chartered.
These are the times when love feels like a cork in the ocean. It won’t sink, but sure as hell, it won’t hold you much above the waves.
Damn. I shouldn’t think so hard. But when I think about love and loving, even just writing it down, it leaves me feeling short of breath. I hear myself gasping ss if, suddenly, the safe condition of my vessel is in doubt, and waves come pounding against my heart.
I’m more than certain, even with all life’s upheaval, the collapsing life I once knew, my tiller unmanned, needing to find again the courage that loving demands.
In my entire life, grief was the hardest storm I ever faced while being unprepared. It takes every ounce of effort to learn that alcohol is not a source of courage.
From that day forward I never managed to steer any course clear across the ocean. I didn’t know if I’d been chilled and frozen by tragedy or it was just the endurance of it all. I’m just a man. Difficult sometimes, easy going, occasionally, romantic to a fault, yet still, when unprepared, it can still all go wrong.
For God’s sake, hold on! This storm will pass.
I always want to speak as a man and not a writer, to explain how I feel, to show that I love the same way every man is best suited to loving a woman. Once, I thought all I needed was words. That words alone would hold a woman close, like dancing without music, drink a hot drink before sleep with her wrapped in my arms.
I started writing, using a lighthouse flash as my signature, blinking out its message as I wrote my letters. Letters, that’s what I am. A man and his letters and what will I do with them? Burn them? That would take some courage, to throw them away on the next gust of wind.
But I don’t have that courage.
I had to find my voice, some way, somehow, so I wrote letters and when came the time, perhaps develop them into something more.
So, I just read the letter about your first trip to Tobermory, sitting on the quayside, watching out to sea, the calmness of it all, the thrill and the discomfort, the untidiness of it all? But the bliss of being together for a couple of days.
As relationships age, we still look for the brighter moments, the times when we see everything so clearly, and it all has a feeling of spirituality about it.
I’m a good man, despite rumors to the contrary. I’m single-minded. I know no man who succeeds all the time and I surely fail in the same way. I’m not trying to be clever with my words.
I think for a long time.
I have loved, and sailed, however shallow the water, or humiliating love has been at times, when nights drew on, the bruising has sorely shown itself.
Not today, though. Today it was my turn to go buy the groceries.
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Paari | Marlene Samuels | Ray Day | Randy Pulley | Michael Rhodes | Lu Skerdoo | Pluto Wolnosci | Paula Shablo | Bruce Coulter | Ellen Baker | Kelley Murphy | Leigh-Anne Dennison | Jennifer Marla Pike | Carmen Ballesteros | Marlana, MSW| Patricia Timmermans | Keeley Schroder |Jan Sebastian And let’s not forget the indomitable, charming, incorrigible, the delightful, yes, please welcome Mr. Harry Hogg
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More from Harry:
Hey, this is Harry. If I’ve written anything that caught your attention, made you smile, maybe shed a teardrop, would you buy me a coffee? How? I’ll explain, for a measly $5 you can read anything, all the writers, poets, songsters, idiots, and other monkey business that happens inside Medium. If you choose to join and compliment me by using my link: Harry Hogg, I’ll receive a portion of your membership fee from Medium, a community that keeps its wallet closed tighter than a duck’s arse! Do I need the money? Will I die, starve, and not continue to drink alcohol? No, I’ll still live happily ever after, but with a smile on my face that someone liked what I’ve written and joined up to follow me and the other writers who make up Medium. Com
