Honey, don't forget the keys

Jangling in my pocket
Everywhere I go
Letting me know
Everything I have is still mine to keep

Opening doors familiar
Like my front door back home
The door to my office
Or my sunlit childhood home.

The tiny object needed
before you leave your house, your car.
My cabin.
So that you may return to a cocoon
Mutating from a bedraggled butterfly
Into a cosy caterpillar

Sometimes the other side of the door is not so anticipated
Even though we have the key
As the clock clicks open
Trust is your only protection
Trust in yourself:
a tremulous trust to keep.

As the door swings open
The cocoon is left behind
A fresh world is waiting
With a brand new set of keys.

Live in your own time zone-

This is quite a serious post but what has bugged me quite a lot lately is how fast the people around me seem to be moving in their own lives. People seem to be running the four hundred metres while I still feel like I am walking the dog. It is giving me flashbacks to the hot, sweaty shame of coming last at every race at school. Have you ever logged on to Facebook only to find yet another person moving to a new city, starting a cool new job, getting engaged or having children, while the only exciting thing you did today is try a mayonaise instead of the usual ketchup on your sandwich. 

The one thing I love most about our generation is our determination to follow our passions- and if we don't like something- our guts to make a change. It sets us apart from our parents or grandparents that stuck with one job for twenty years even if they were not always in love with it. There are so many inspirational people I know. They are kicking ass every day- getting articles published in magazines, writing and publishing whole books, travelling to different parts of the world and even starting a life in a brand new scary country. These are the people that inspire me to believe anything is possible. The only thing needed to be done is to take a risk. 

The only downside to this is logging on Facebook is starting to feel like Russian roulette. I still love checking up on everyone but everytime i open the familiar blue and white pages- I am exposed to a new engagement, a new move and a new job while I cannot even commit to trying the dodgy-looking new noodles in the crew mess. I am overwhelmed by how repetitive, ordinary and "stuck-in-the-rut" my own life has become. It becomes yet another thing I don't like when I look in the mrror. 

Don't get me wrong I am not one of those people who believe that we are in competition or that you have to "climb over others to reach the top of the ladder" in your career. I believe that there is room for everyone to get what they want as we are all different, have different goals and offer such different skills and talents. There is room for everyone and if others can get a cool job, move to a different city, get a degree or travel to somewhere amazing I do not see any reason why I cannot. The only problem is time. 

These massive life moves take time to happen. While I was happily uploading my graduation pictures, my friends studying medical degrees were sitting at their laptops- fingernails clicking impatiently on their desks crammed with notes for a degree they still had no idea that they will pass. While some are signing wedding contracts others are still looking for someone that will text them back once in a while. While some are getting their dream jobs others are trawling the jobs section of the newspaper- rocking up at interview after interview. The people getting what took time to get it and we all do not get what we want at the same time. South Africa is six hours ahead of Tortola British Virgin Island. It is not early or late. It is simply in a different time zone. The same goes for people. 

My best friends from my last contract on a ship sailing from New York left the cruise ship industry a few months ago. They criticised me for going back for another contract. They had both been on ships for longer than I had. They had already left a contract thinking they should quit yet gone back for another try. By the time they left they were truly done yet I needed a few more months to get there. I still wanted some more adventure. We were in different time zones. 

Some graduate by the age of 21 yet only find a their dream job by the age of thirty. Some graduate at age 29 and find a job immediately. Some get married at 21 and are divorced by 40 yet others get married at 40 and remain happily married until they die. There is no way of measuring yourself up against others as we are all have our own journeys. 

This doesn't mean that I am going to feel any better when I log onto my facebook page and I see someone two years younger than me engaged with her own apartment while I do not even have my own room- it is just something I have to remind myself that my moment is still on its way. So watch this space. My time zone is a pretty nice place to live after all. 

Dear Diary: Old endings become new beginnings

Today is no ordinary day for me. Today marks the final leg of my contract at sea. It marks the time where I start counting down the weeks and not the months. I have two months left on this ship. That is eight cruises, eight formal nights, eight embarkation days, eight more days in St Thomas, eight more afternoons in the Bahamas, two days out in Miami and sixteen more hours to enjoy Tortola. I have eight more blog posts to tell you about the Carribbean. After that? Who knows where in the world I will be.

Drinking wine while sailing into St Thomas-one of my favourite memories this contract

It is funny how you feel you have tons of time but when that time is over you feel it has flown by without any time for you to catch your breath in between. This contract has passed so swiftly leaving the bittersweet taste of warm beer from the crew bar, the caress of island sunshine and the stale smell of the dusty air conditioning system installed on the Escape.

I personally cannot believe I survived a full four months of smiling at strangers and visiting the same islands every week. Miami, St Thomas, Tortola, Nassau, Bahamas. Every week. It sounds wonderfully exciting to the old me- stuck in  one city for years, however my heart has become a gypsy heart- always on the run. I no longer itch for travel, I lust for it and it would be very difficult to settle for any kind of life living in one place.

My ship contracts used to have at least three different cruise itineraries. I sailed to Alaska, to Mexico, Columbia and the Panama Canal, finishing up in Jamaica. I have done the Eastern Carribbean, then the Western Carribbean. I took a ride on the ship to Nova Scotia, Canada for a few weeks. It was there when I fell in love with ships. Almost every day I woke up in a different place every day, I lounged on a different beach, hiked up a different trail and saw a different site I had never seen before. True, I was never fully experiencing each place based on the limited time we had there but life passed in a never-ending whirlwind of colour.

Throwback to NYC- fresh from the Ocean

From the late nights in crew bar to the breakfasts in NYC- working in ships was different to living in any city in the world. New people came almost every week and old people left. It is a place where the only constant, stable thing is change itself. 

Somehow it no longer feels like that anymore- my nights in crew bar have become shorter and less regular, my itinerary has stayed the same for the full six months and, even though I wake up in a different place every day it is still the same place I went to the week before. Do not get me wrong- I still have fun. I just can't shake the feeling that I am living in one place- that moves around but is still the same.

Perhaps I am growing up, perhaps the novelty of ships have worn off. I know that when you have been on ships long enough to know that the disgusting mix of dough and bones in brown liquid they call "Carribbean soup" is actually delicious then you are no longer fresh to the game. (I am not  kidding there was always a line for that soup and I used to wonder what was wrong with those people. I now AM one of those people. Anyhow- something tells me I have learnt all I can from working and living here and I know in my heart it is time to move on.

"Moving on" in Miami.

This is why I am certain this will be my last few weeks on a cruise ship- the beginning of the end. I have plans for the future but I do not yet know what is next to come. For now I will enjoy my last few weeks in the Carribbean as much as I enjoy the last few sips of beer at 2am. I will relish my journey back home and- no matter what happens next I will always keep you posted. 

A Carribbean toast to new beginnings.