diagnoses: salty blood and land-locked prosthetic legs

I know it is drawing near. I can feel it in the depth of my being. I am beginning to awaken to a salt taste in my mouth. I catch myself singing Jimmy Buffet while using the head. I start saying things such as “I’ll be dining in the galley this evening,” or “shiver me timbers!” In only 18 days I will be smoking my “so long cigar” as I have so many other ports I bid farewell.

It draws nigh, I dream about it. Sailing along on a starboard tack, a fresh breeze blowing across my shoulder as I sheet in and pinch up into the wind. A rogue wave slams my starboard bow and sprays my face. I grit my teeth and wash the salt from my mouth with a rum and coke.

The sea beckons me back: the rolling black water, slow flashing lighthouses, stationary stars under my rolling deck, shirtless days and shoeless nights.
A dear friend of mine is leaving the Bahamas to his stern as I write; he will ride the gulf stream north until we meet in less than 3 short weeks.

I look forward to a summer with him and his family filled with blue crabs steamed in beer, loud children sucking the marrow out of life (and coincidentally out of me), a hundred new sailors born on the waters of the Potomac and a girl by my side enjoying the life God so graciously blessed us with. Blessings.