Stranded Deep

Day 1

Waves. Sound is the first sense to come back to me, lying on my back in some ungodly shape. As my eyes adjust to the blinding light I begin to feel the sensation of warmth across my skin, the suns warmth in particular. The sun has a very specific warmth, and this time I was tricked into believing I was somewhere pleasant for a moment. It was just then that it dawned on me, wasn’t I just on a fucking plane to Costa Rica? Where the fuck am I now? Why the fuck am I in a yellow raft in the middle of the fucking ocean? This is a dream right, surely this is a dream.

I slap myself to see if I’ll wake up from this place, not yet aware that this dream was a nightmare and even worse, that the nightmare was real fucking life. Without an awareness that I even had it in me and before I could figure out if it were fear of death or of not yet truly living, some form of survival instinct rushed to my being. My awareness heightened, my vision became more acute, my focus narrowed and my understanding of my surroundings doubled. It were as if a million years of DNA, a million years of survival came rushing forward, ready to move me on, to give me a fighting chance.

Lifeline

Immediately my focus goes to the vessel keeping my god forsaken body alive. Yellow, about 8ft long by 4ft wide, made with a thick plastic, similar to the rafts I was in earlier in the year, white water rafting in the Canadian Rockies, but not as durable. This sucka won't much help if a storm picks up but right now, when this ocean I’m afloat on is calm like it is just now, that’s when this will come in handy. That being said, I don’t know how long until the weather changes, tropical storms can come and go in an hour so I better get to land, wherever the fuck that is. I scour the horizon, and just my luck, 4 tiny islands speckle the great vast blue. The only reason I notice is a faint yellow and green amongst the endless ocean, giving me so much joy and hope its almost unbearable. At that moment, before I get ahead of myself, I turn my focus back towards the raft and its contents. What is amongst this vessel, what can save me. Fortunately I find the rafts paddle tied to the side of my little boat of salvation, I untie it and as I do I peer into the abyss beneath me. I hadn’t looked overboard yet. Fear of seeing the worst. Endless blue.

I can think of nothing more frightening than being alone in the middle of the ocean floating above a pit of nothingness. Looking down and seeing zilch, nothing, nada, not a speck, other than the odd ray of light that pierces the water and catches algae as it fades. My stomach jerks, my skin begins to radiate heat and sweat, my head sways and dizziness sinks in. Now the faint wobble of the raft on the waves is perceived as a terrible rollercoaster, lifting me up and out and then crashing me back down into the bottomless bucket of horrors beneath. Fuck this shit, a faint whisper creeps in through the back of my head, fuck this shit, it gets louder now as I pay it more and more attention, FUCK THIS FUCKING SHIT, I scream as I thrust the paddle into the water and begin my voyage.

Le Voyage

One mile, maybe two, three at the very most. Land always looks closer on the waters surface, it tricks your mind, plays games on you. The land looks significantly larger now, I know I’ve made good ground. A couple times I swear I felt a bump on the craft, I didn’t look down for the fucking love of me but I did stop paddling, both times. I just waited, after the bump I just waited there, hoping it wasn’t the worst. Thankfully nothing scooped me up, nothing knocked me over. I couldn’t think how rough it would be to flip this raft right now, my little lifeline. The water is warm to the touch, I can feel it as it splashes up and down my back with each stroke of the paddle.

As Ive been paddling I’ve been trying to figure out the contents of this raft, I don’t want to take my eyes of the horizon for too long, fear of going astray, but I need to find out what’s useful to me in this raft, I need to know what to grab first if all hell breaks loose and I ended up having to swim for shore. I can’t afford to lose something of value, something that might make or break my survival here. Canisters, lots of canisters, six or seven at least, like oversized coke cans. There’s a red box, hard shell, two black clasps hug the front of it, waterproof for sure, buoyant I believe. I think that’s a flare gun. The canisters mentioned earlier, rations, I hope. A map would be ideal, a radio even better. Water is my first priority, I know this already, but first, I need to get the fuck to land.

Landing

As I pull closer to the first of the four islands I notice they are grouped together like a diamond. There is a small sandbar that appears to connect two of the islands. Some small rocky structure is rising from the furthest of the four, trees center each island and as my raft closes the distance my worst nightmares fade away and become only slightly worse versions of themselves. The endless pit of black and blue beneath gives way to coral structures and a seafloor made of sand patched with rocks and more coral. Colorful fish scatter and dart in every direction and of every kind, blue, red, white, yellow, purple, striped, spotted, big, small, the list goes on. I hardly notice my speed now and come grinding up against some rocks, I had aimed my raft for one of the two islands connected by the sandbank, hoping that the ability to move across to the second island with ease would provide more resources, and I had nailed my landing, other than being a little too distracted by the colorful display of fish (and to be honest I was really just looking for sharks) and banking on a few rocks.

The raft came to a standstill, the rocking motion of the oceans rollercoaster had finally stopped. My head stopped its incessant bobbing up and down. I peered out of the vessel that had just saved my life, out towards the island, out towards my only hope of survival and I said to myself, no retreat, no surrender. And as I whispered the words, I felt King Leonidas and the 300 Spartans at the Battle of Thermopylae and I felt every ounce of their courage and bravery and strength and I knew then, that even If I didn’t make it, even if my flesh rots and my bones break and my time is up, I did my best.

Day 3

I haven’t really slept yet…