Castaway

I am adrift.  I feel like I’m stuck alone in a small boat on the ocean.  Like I’m out of food, and running out of water, and like there’s really no hope of reaching home on my own.

I can see another boat.  She is the most beautiful sight I have ever laid eyes on.  And she starts coming towards me.  She gets close enough that I can hear her sailors shouting to one another on the breeze.  I shout out.  I try to make the boat hear me, and understand how desperately I need her.  But she turns away and starts heading the other direction.  My stomach drops toward the ocean bottom leaving behind bile and acid burning my chest.  I paddle towards her with all the strength I can muster, but I just can’t keep up.  She gets farther away.

And then she turns towards me again.  She comes closer.   She’s tacking into the headwind, and comes closer this time than on the last turn.  I start to hope that things are going to work out.  That she’ll hear me and take me aboard.  And just when I think she’s close enough that she’ll hear what I’m shouting, she turns away again.  I keep paddling.  I don’t know what else to do. 

What do you do in that situation except paddle and hope? 

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