Which distance is greater,
the one that separates the continents and nations,
or the distance between heart to heart that separates humanity?
Imagine a voyage across twelve time zones.
"It is right that we should be driven by the wind," said Jennie. "When a storm comes up one feels alive! Then, all that one has within one, that one is, is weighed in a balance."
"Indeed, there's nothing trivial about the wind," Igor commented.
I agreed with them both, though I counted us lucky that we weren't in a full-blown storm.
By eight o'clock the overcast began to break up, patches of blue appeared, and an hour later, puffy, white, innocent clouds filled the sky as if the rain had never happened. Only the wind was still a bit strong. This posed a problem. We needed a day of calm, to put our 'ship' in order. The cabin was filled to the ceiling with everything we owned. The weather couldn't have been better for sailing. The sky was bright, the air brisk, warm, inviting, the ocean was stirred up into long waves that one could ride for extra speed. Except, speed wasn't what we needed. I was as sleepy as I had been after leaving Tofino. My eyelids were heavy. The brightness caused me to squint. I fell asleep at the helm. Sometimes Jennie roused me, sometimes the rocking of the boat did, sometimes Igor. Jennie and Igor kept themselves awake by working. The most urgent task was to clear a passage to the rear bunks, and to make some room in the galley. Eventually, Igor slept on a pile of clothing, bedding, dishes, and junk packed tightly together.
"This will take us weeks," I heard Jennie mutter and then call for help to move a box of canned food.
"Who cares about time?" I said. "We've got plenty of time for that later. Just make a passage to the bunks and to the stove if you can."
"That's easy for you to say," she shouted back against the noise of the wind. I'm sure she did her best. It wasn't until late afternoon that she had breakfast organized. The afternoon felt surprisingly short. We had decided to change shift every four hours. I think my initial shift was more like ten hours long. Still, in one way or another, we all got plenty of rest.
The cleanup project continued for days. Still, it had to be completed before we could make plans as to where we would go. For the time being we simply sailed with the eastern tradewinds. Without taking inventory of our food supplies, we had no idea of how long we could survive at sea.
We sailed west with the tradewinds for four days until the job was accomplished. At dinner that night, the big moment finally came to decide on a destination. The inventory had revealed that our supplies would carry us for at least fifteen weeks. We were provisioned to reach any place in the world without requiring any extra food.
Jennie suggested that Australia might be a good place to go. "Australia has plenty of room, no shortage of food," she said. Her plan was to stay there until we could go to Japan and be re-united. I, on the other hand, had China in mind. I wanted us to be close to Japan at all times. Igor, however, suggested the most daring plan of them all, something way out that I had never considered as a practical possibility. He wanted us to sail through the Suez Canal to the Ukraine that was once a part of the Soviet Union and was still friendly to it. It was obvious we all had made our private plan. Now it was time to choose one of them. As we considered the possibilities, one at a time, the most important criteria were food and room to live. Our next concern was for the children. Would they be safe? One question about Russia came to mind. It grew in importance the longer we talked about it. Would we be able to continue our association in Russia, or would we be separated?
We decided to delay the decision until the next morning, with one more night to sleep on it so to speak. "What choice do we really have?" I asked Jennie in private after Igor had gone to bed.
