I Don’t Want to Talk About It

Mario’s Log: September 5th, 2025

It feels like a lot longer. Back in May of this year, on a shakedown cruise (of me) with Scott, Jon, and Ivy from St. Thomas to Marathon, I stood my first midwatch aboard Sarah-Sarah. It was a job interview, really. A look see; Scott and Jon trying to figure out if they had any interest in spending months at sea with me as crew. In an attempt to make myself seem valuable (and for other reasons) I volunteered for the midwatch. No one likes a guy who waits for someone else to take mids, I thought. I mean I knew the dog liked me, but she wasn’t making the Passage trip; it was her dad I had to convince. That night, 104 nights ago to be exact, something unexpected happened. Being alone on the helm woke memories from the first time I’d ever been alone on the helm of a boat as the crew slept and I remembered why I loved being at sea.

With no one else awake and no one and no thing for miles in any direction, being at the helm of a boat at sea is the closest any of us ever get to real solitude anymore. Think about it; when was the last time you were awake for four hours and didn’t say a word to, or hear one from, another living soul? Mids is forced meditation. It’s the absence of everything else; of chatter, of sea stories, of problems to solve or wounds to salve. It is the wind outside and the thrum of the motor and whatever is going on in your head and nothing else. If I wanted to start a religious cult, I’d start by building a helm station.

“I think you need this,” Julie said to me after I had finished that first thousand-mile job interview. Me leaving her home alone for two-plus months while I played with my new friends in the Arctic was not something she expected, but I think she could sense – right away – what four nights of mids and the open ocean had done to me. She thought I could use more of it, I guess. Having just retired from the least quiet and least alone period of my working life (and that includes the four-years I spent on an aircraft carrier) I was more than ready for a distraction from heavy thoughts and important decisions.

Besides the truly epic views and the wildlife and the ice and almost constant laughter of this great crew, this voyage has been – apart from every other wonderful thing – 58 days of focus. It’s been two months of the Captain’s constant reminder of “don’t hit anything,” the only thing that really matters for the guy on the helm. Having one job, one thing, one most important function is clarifying for the soul, I’ve found. And we’ve got a couple more weeks, maybe three, of this trip before we tie up in Anacortes and say our goodbyes, but tonight is my last midwatch. I don’t want to talk about it, really, but I’m going to miss it.

These long stretches of time with the thrum of that good engine behind me and no one to talk to have been – and again, I didn’t expect it – one of my favorite things about it. Imagine that, some of the greatest views in the world part of the every day, and what am I going to miss? Not being able to see anything beyond the helm as we move through the dark and on to what’s next.

That says something about me, I guess, and we’ll want to get into that later. But, for now, I’m just going to sit at this helm station and watch nothing appear on the FLIR or the RADAR and think about everything we’ve seen and done on this trip and not talk about anything. I found one last scoop of hot chocolate, the last dregs for my last night watch, and I’m going to sip it and take it all in on this last turn with midnight for awhile.

And you? Whoever you are, nice enough to be reading this far and having taken an interest in this trip, if you’ll forgive the intrusion, I have some advice. Set an alarm some time soon for midnight. Go to bed early if you like. Get up and make yourself something warm to drink. Sit in the dark, alone, and look out into nothing or the moonlight or whatever is nearby and don’t talk about anything. Just sit there and think …”don’t hit anything.”