Knowing One’s Place on the Earth
You might think I’m talking about GPS, but no. I have something more basic in mind.
I have just come in from my morning workout. Today’s was a half-hour walk followed by half an hour of Tai Chi. Getting enough exercise on the ship concerns me, because keeping an energetic flow of blood in my brain is one of the things that makes it possible for me to write. Without regular exercise, in the words of W.B. Yeats, “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold…” It’s a well established fact that nothing improves creativity quite as effectively as 20 minutes or more of moderate exercise each day. It also helps to keep the demons that pepper the subconscious of the average horror writer at bay, or at least manageable.
Here are a couple of pictures of two important people in my life: Cari St. Aubin, my trainer from Fitness Power gym where I work out a couple of times a week; and Joe Deisher, who has patiently guided me through the first Tai Chi Chuan singles form over the course of about the last decade. (Okay, I am not exactly a quick study.)
The Nathaniel B. Palmer has a pretty decent gym, by all accounts. And I intend to take advantage of it. Cari has gone to some trouble to create an exercise regimen for me to follow during the voyage. This will involve a couple of elastic resistance bands and a balance ball, combined with the treadmill and the universal weight machine on the ship. And Joe has, as mentioned, managed to get me all the way through the Tai Chi form before our departure date. Doing Tai Chi on the ship only requires a clear place on a flat surface, and the cooperation of the sea, which is not to be taken for granted, a pretty big understatement.
Of course, being me, I have worries. They begin with the fact that the Drake Passage, which lies between Punta Arenas and the Antarctic Peninsula, is known as perhaps the roughest patch of water in the world. I have visions of the exercise ball roaring around the gym (or around the cabin I’ll be sharing with an as yet unnamed roommate) on its own as the ship dives through monstrous seas. Of myself flying off the treadmill — which I have done before on a sunny day on solid ground. The idea of my standing on one leg prior to a kick and slice while the deck tilts 40 degrees…well, let’s just say when my parents gave me a name that means “grace,” I was still too young for anyone to know what a good laugh that would end up being.
This morning as I stood on the terrace and began the first movements of the Tai Chi Chuan form, I found myself in something of an altered state, probably owing to nerves and a stubborn headache. The morning light seemed oddly dark, the wind filled with a weird, wet scent from some other season. And Frank Worseley’s nearly superhuman feat, navigating Shackleton’s three small boats from the site of the Endurance’s demise to Elephant Island, a distance of some 650 nautical miles across stormy, frigid water using only a watch and a sextant, came floating into my mind. Worseley’s fine sense of himself in relation to the larger world around him is worth emulating — or trying to.
BTW, Father Nayture, thank you for spreading the word among the Scouts. (See comment on “Flight of the Iceberg Bomber.”) I hope they’ll enjoy my maunderings.
Good Morning Nancy
I will be teaching the Geology Activity Pin to Webelos Scouts, and the Geology Merit Badge to the older scouts. One of the requirements is:
“Describe the effects of wind, water, and ice on the landscape.”
I plan to talk about your expedition and show them that this Webelos Activity is so important that the National Science Foundation has an expedition to study this very topic!!